Bill C-311 (Historical)

Climate Change Accountability Act

An Act to ensure Canada assumes its responsibilities in preventing dangerous climate change

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, I want to thank all four gentlemen for testifying. I know that you're very busy scientists. I appreciate your taking time away from the important work you're doing on documenting and bringing forward the issues that are being attached to climate change to testify to us and try to influence our opinion. I consider your testimony extremely valuable.

My first question I would put to Dr. Fortier and Dr. Stone, but Dr. Sauchyn and Dr. Zwiers can feel free to elaborate as well.

I think it was you, Dr. Fortier, who mentioned that the failure of Canada to commit to the science-based targets as laid out in Bill C-311 and as put forward by the IPCC has impacted our international reputation and competitiveness. Based on what I've read and the international conferences I've appeared at, that opinion seems to be backed up by a wide range of groups, including the International Energy Agency, UNEP, and the Copenhagen Climate Council. So that certainly seems to be a growing common view.

If Canada committed to these targets in Bill C-311, would that help to begin to restore our international stature at those tables?

[Prof. Louis Fortier]

Actually, you can find several plans in Canada. There is one for each of the provinces.

For example, in Quebec we have a plan to reduce emissions and try to mitigate the impacts that will have on society and everything. You can also consult the plans that each of the American states are producing.

So there are a lot of plans. The common denominator to all those plans is a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, like the one proposed in Bill C-311.

[Dr. David Sauchyn, Research Professor, Prairie Adaptation Research Collaborative, University of Regina, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee, for this opportunity to speak to you.

The preamble to Bill C-311 accurately describes climate change as a serious threat to Canada. In fact, it is also a threat to people in environments worldwide; and Canada, with its high per capita emissions, contributes to that threat.

My remarks today will be based largely on our work at the Prairie Adaptation Research Collaborative in Regina, where we study climate change and its impacts on western Canada and the adaptation that's required to avoid the most adverse impacts. This work makes a strong case for efforts to prevent further global warming, and thus supports the intent of Bill C-311.

Our work clearly demonstrates that current climate change and most of the impacts are largely caused by human activities, that the impacts in the near future are potentially serious and costly, and that the degree of adaptation required, and therefore its cost and feasibility, will depend on the amount of global warming that we allow to occur.

I have some information about the IPCC fourth assessment report, but given that you've heard from two experts who are involved in that process, I will skip that information and keep our remarks to well under 10 minutes. I will add only that the fourth assessment report, which was published in 2007, synthesized the state of knowledge of global climate change up to the year 2006. Since then, various updates of climate science have concluded that not only are the impacts of climate change occurring as predicted by the IPCC, but also that they are occurring at a faster rate than was forecast in 2007.

That's the extent of my remarks about the IPCC. I want to move instead to the Canadian assessment, to this big, thick report that you all should have read, or at least you should have read the thin synthesis for decision-makers. This is in both official languages...and this is only one language.

This report was released in March 2008. Over 3,000 studies that pertain to Canada were synthesized by 145 authors. Our chapters were reviewed by 110 scientific experts and government officials.

I will mention only four of our conclusions: first, that the impacts of a changing climate are already evident in every region of Canada; second, that climate change presents new risks and opportunities to Canada; third, that climate change impacts elsewhere in the world will affect Canadians; and fourth, that the impacts of recent extreme weather events highlight the vulnerability of Canadian communities and critical infrastructure.

Canada is a major contributor to the problem in terms of our per capita emissions, but we also have more capacity and incentive to respond to climate change than most nations, if not all. Our capacity is a function of our great natural, social, and intellectual wealth. The many incentives for responding include new economic and technological opportunities on the path to sustainable communities, sustainable ecosystems, and a sustainable economy.

Another major incentive is avoiding cost and risk. All of Canada is at risk.

The highest rates of observed and projected warming in the world are in the northern hemisphere at high latitudes, high altitudes, and in the continental interiors. Thus, Canada's north and the western interior are among the most vulnerable regions on earth. Of course, these regions have Canada's largest indigenous populations, and thus our most vulnerable communities.

By our very human nature, we would prefer a simple world that doesn't change. As Dr. Fortier said, for the sake of our children and grandchildren, we would prefer a predictable and stable world. The climate change deniers capitalize on these basic human instincts by telling us what we'd like to believe--that things are fine and that we don't have to do anything. However, they tend to grossly oversimplify the science and diminish the problem, while exaggerating the costs of reducing our carbon footprint.

There are a few complexities to the science that are important to understand, so please bear with me. Dr. Zwiers has already mentioned the carbon cycle feedbacks whereby a warmer climate tends to release more carbon from natural sources, but I want to mention a couple of other feedbacks.

First of all, the extra greenhouse gases that we are producing are triggering global warming, but they account for only a part, and in some cases only a small part, of the projected warming. That's because a warmer atmosphere and warmer oceans trigger a web of interactions and feedbacks that mostly amplify the warming. Probably the best example anywhere is in the Arctic, where the so-called ice-albedo feedback can increase the rate of global warming up to threefold. That's the process by which permanent snow and ice cover are rapidly diminishing, so that less radiation is reflected back into space and more is absorbed to warm the land, the Arctic Ocean, and the overlying air.

When you consider that some climate change scenarios project global warming of up to 4.5°C, three times that, or 12.5°C, would be catastrophic for the Arctic.

The other major feedback I want to mention affects Canada's other vast vulnerable region, which is out here, the western interior, where we have more than 80% of Canada's agricultural land. With global warming, there is increased evaporation from the oceans and higher humidity in the atmosphere. As Dr. Zwiers mentions, this increase in water vapour accounts for more precipitation over land, but it also traps more heat. You just have to think about the difference in early morning temperatures between a cloudy and a clear night.

This humidity feedback accounts for the forecast of more rain in the west, but in fact we also expect more drought. That's because most of the extra heat and water is occurring in winter, but we grow things during the warm, dry part of the year, in summer. So it's an important scientific detail to understand that the influence of this humidity feedback is to amplify the warming in western Canada in particular, but also to intensify the natural variability.

Canada already has one of the world's most variable climates, especially in the west. Therefore, the threat from climate change is not so much a change in the average climate but an increase in the variability.

About this new average and the more extreme weather--and in particular, in the west, drought--drought is Canada's most costly climate hazard. For example, the most recent drought of 2001-02 caused crop losses of $3.6 billion and a drop in GDP in western Canada of $4.5 billion. This kind of volatility can never be managed away. It challenges our capacity to adapt. Therefore, the best strategy is to simply avoid it, to simply prevent the global warming that is projected to cause an increase in the severity and frequency of drought.

I thank you for indulging in this simple science lesson. I think it's important, because I want you to appreciate how, by supporting policy that limits greenhouse gas emissions, you are taking your finger off the trigger of a cascade of processes and feedbacks that have some potentially unfortunate consequences.

Thank you.

[Professor Louis Fortier, Scientific Director, Network of Centres of Excellence ArcticNet, Laval University, As an Individual]

Mr. Chairman, committee members,

thank you for hearing me on Bill C-311.

I would like to raise three points which, I hope, will demonstrate the political and socio-economic importance of the bill, as well as its excellent timing given what is happening in the world today.

For the first point, allow me to be somewhat blunt. In recent years, Canada's abysmal record in the fight against greenhouse gas emissions has had terrible impacts on our international stature as a country. We plummeted from the enviable position of world leader on environmental issues in the early 1990s to a reputation of a foot-dragging crony of the U.S.A.

Now that the U.S.A. and Australia have made a clear about-face, Canada is left in the cold, collecting fossil prizes at each international meeting.

Based on many conferences presented to the general public, let me assure you that this resistance and the resulting international disapproval are insufferable to many Canadians who are genuinely concerned with climate change. Bill C-311 would certainly help rebuild Canada's international stature in the stewardship of the global environment.

Second and perhaps more important, the 80% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, which would be imposed by Bill C-311, would necessarily require a complete and crucial transformation of the Canadian economy. We will have to either buy at great cost or develop ourselves the technology and the infrastructure to shift from an economy rooted in cheap petrol and the gas engine to an economy based on renewable energies and the electric car.

This is the direction that the modern world is taking now. Canada is already losing ground to several countries, such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Sweden, and Denmark, which are taking aggressive measures to wean themselves off fossil fuels. These are countries that will soon dominate the world's economy, thanks to immensely more efficient and competitive industries. For example, it is forecasted that 30% of the one billion vehicles that will roam the planet by 2030 will be hybrid or fully electric cars and will be charged from electric grids powered primarily by solar energy.

Based on the fact that it took about 10 years to replace the horse with the automobile, I personally think and hope that this transformation will take place even faster. How will Canada position itself in this new electro-solar economy? We have the engineering skills and the industrial basis to take some leadership.

For example, researchers at the Institut de recherches en électricité du Québec have just developed a lithium battery that can be recharged at unprecedented rates, thus making possible a wide-autonomy all-electric car.

Are we going to wait for the Americans and the Japanese to develop these new technologies for us, or are we going to encourage the development of our own capacity to wean our society from fossil fuels, thereby fulfilling at the same time our climate responsibilities and making Canada an exporter rather than an importer of this new technology?

The alternative of fossilizing Canada in the fossil fuel-based economy will be suicidal as the era of cheap oil comes to an end. It would lead to the degradation of the Canadian economy that would parallel the decline of the Soviet economies in the second half of the last century. Bill C-311 would certainly force Canada to make the right choice between competitiveness and fossilization.

Third, I would like to stress that the fate of Bill C-311 will hinge to some extent on whether or not at the time of the vote MPs are convinced of the reality of dangerous climate change. Now, like the severed heads of the mythological Hydra, the unbalanced debate on the reality of climate change is perpetually growing back in the media.

For example, just last Friday in his very popular editorial, Mr. Rex Murphy again steered the debate by referring to a BBC report that pointed out that despite rising carbon dioxide levels, global temperatures have not risen over the past 10 years. Mr. Murphy's prose smacked of contempt when assimilating scientists to the zealots of some climate change religion.

It is important to point out that for scientists, the reality of climate warming is not an issue of fate. It's an issue of hard data, hard fact. Like any other citizens, scientists all wish climate change would go away and would no longer threaten our future and that of our children. However, the hard scientific facts are that despite some expected decadal fluctuations, global temperatures are definitely on the rise.

Decadal interludes in rising global temperatures and in the declining trend in Arctic sea ice cover have occurred before, but except for those who crave to disillusion themselves, there is absolutely no basis in the recent data to feel confident that global warming is over with.

While Mr. Murphy puts much confidence in the BBC report written by a journalist, what does he make of the recent warning by U.K. climate scientists that the 2°C warming over the next 40 years—on which the Copenhagen discussions will be based—is overly optimistic and that a 4°C increase must be envisaged instead?

This is what I mean by an unbalanced debate, in which a journalist has more weight than several dozen climate specialists.

My point here is that while the debate on climate change is certainly healthy, Bill C-311 is utterly crucial for Canada's international stature and our economic future—as I tried to explain in my first two points. Hence, MPs ought to base their work on the bill and vote on it based on verified scientific consensus rather than on the flavour of the day in the never-ending debate over climate warming.

Thank you.

[Professor John Stone, Adjunct Research Professor, Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Carleton University, As an Individual]

Good morning.

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you. Much of what I have to say is based on the fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, although I will provide some updated information where it suggests that the need to act is becoming more urgent. My remarks focus on the long term and the immediate future.

Emissions of greenhouse gases continue to rise and are now growing at 3.5% per year. In fact, emissions for the last few years have been larger than the worst-case scenario developed by the IPCC in their Special Report on Emissions Scenarios in 2000. This worst-case scenario projects carbon dioxide concentrations in 2100 of almost four times pre-industrial levels with global temperatures around 4°C. We certainly don't want to go there. The impacts could be catastrophic.

Atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are indeed continuing to grow. Currently, the concentration of carbon dioxide—the most important greenhouse gas—is almost 390 parts per million, which is a 38% increase since pre-industrial times and the highest it has been in almost one million years. The annual rate in increase in the 1990s was about 1.5% per year; it is now close to 2.5%. This carbon dioxide will stay in the atmosphere for many centuries. As it does, it will continue to trap heat and warm the planet.

As a result of these changes, global average temperatures have risen. Global average temperatures are now outside the range observed over the last 1,300 years. The last time the polar regions were significantly warmer than at present for an extended period, there was little ice at the poles, and sea levels were four to six metres higher. What is more troubling is that the linear warming trend over the last 50 years is nearly twice that for the last 100 years. In other words, the closer one comes to the present, the more the rate of increase of global temperatures increases.

There are other indications that climate change may be accelerating. Closer to home—I'm sure Louis Fortier will elaborate—the Arctic sea ice is declining faster than any of our models has been projecting. The reduction in 2007 was unprecedented in the period for which we have reliable, comprehensive measurements. In some estimations, late summer Arctic sea ice could disappear almost entirely within the next few decades rather than by the end of the century, as was previously thought. The ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are melting faster than we have seen before, and we have been forced to entirely rethink our understanding of glacier physics. As a result, current projections of sea level rise are as much as twice that reported in the IPCC's fourth assessment report.

All of this suggests to me that we have to act, and act urgently, to address the threat of climate change. Time is not on our side. An explicit long-term goal is regarded as being absolutely essential. Without such a goal, none of us—individuals, businesses, and other levels of government—will have a clear direction for policy and action. Such a goal must be strong enough to stimulate the necessary ambition.

But this is not enough. We also need short- and medium-term objectives. Once each short-term objective is achieved, decisions on subsequent steps can be made in the light of new knowledge and reduced uncertainties.

Ideally, the choice of a long-term goal is the product of solid science and wise political decision-making. Science can inform the process, but in the end it depends on what we value, and this is best determined through a political process.

It is estimated that if we stabilized concentrations of all greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at roughly the equivalent of 450 parts per million of carbon dioxide, we could limit global mean temperature increases to about 2°C above pre-industrial levels.

Such a stabilization level, however, implies concentrations of carbon dioxide alone of 350 to 400 parts per million, which has to be compared with today's level of 390 parts per million. Clearly it's going to be difficult now to meet this goal without some overshoot from which we will have to recover.

There is a growing consensus that indeed we should try to avoid such an increase of 2°C above pre-industrial levels, in order to avoid what the framework convention refers to as “dangerous interference with the climate”. We have already seen an increase of 0.7°C, and in order to achieve this goal it is estimated that global greenhouse gas emissions will have to peak before 2015 and be at least at 50% of current levels by 2050.

These are global numbers, and achieving these low-emission scenarios requires a comprehensive global mitigation effort. The IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report contains some estimates of what this would possibly mean for industrialized countries. Countries like Canada will need to reduce their emissions in 2020 by 25% to 40% below 1990 levels and in 2050 by approximately 80% to 95%. These ranges cover the levels suggested in Bill C-311. Emissions in developing countries, on the other hand, would need to start to be below their current business-as-usual emissions pathways by 2020 and be substantially below these pathways by 2050. Such a commitment was made recently by the Chinese premier, at the United Nations meeting on climate change in New York.

Now let me switch briefly to the other end of the spectrum and talk about what we have to do now.

Very simply, time is running out. What we do in the next decade or so will be critical to tackling the long-term threat of climate change. Decisions to delay emission reductions will likely be more costly and riskier. Delaying decisions will seriously constrain opportunities to achieve future low stabilization levels and raise the risk of progressively more severe climate change impacts.

It's been estimated that each 10-year delay in mitigation implies an additional 0.2°C to 0.3°C of warming over the next 100 to 400 years. Because of the inertia of the climate system, there is at present already approximately 0.6°C of additional warming, as it were, in the bank. Together with the warming we've already experienced of 0.7°C, this gets us perilously close already to the 2°C target.

As the IPCC has stated, evidence of climate change is unequivocal. The scientific community has issued a warning, a warning that may now be underestimated. Addressing climate change will be a long-term challenge, but one we must start addressing now. There is no excuse for inaction. The climate has a memory, and it will not let us forget.

To conclude, let me quote from the World Development Report 2010 issued recently by the World Bank, which says we need to “act now, act together, and act differently”.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Order. We're ready to go.

We're going to kick off our meeting, which is meeting number 32, resuming the study of Bill C-311, An Act to ensure Canada assumes its responsibilities in preventing dangerous climate change. This is pursuant to the order of reference that was given on Wednesday, April 1, 2009.

I want to welcome those who are joining us today at committee.

John Stone is an adjunct research professor in the department of geography and environmental studies at Carleton University.

We also have Francis Zwiers. He is with the climate research division at the Department of the Environment.

We have Louis Fortier, who is scientific director with the Network of Centres of Excellence ArcticNet at Laval University.

Joining us by video conference from Regina is David Sauchyn, research professor at Prairie Adaptation Research Collaborative, University of Regina.

Welcome, all. It's great having all of you here.

I ask that all of you keep your opening presentations to under ten minutes. I will signal to you when we're getting close to ten minutes, if you're pushing it. But to be fair to the committee, we want to have a fulsome discussion in the two hours we have slated.

With that, I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Stone.

Please go ahead.

Bill C-311--Climate Change Accountability Act

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Madam Speaker, I will do my best to say what I need to within five minutes then.

I am thankful for the opportunity to speak to the motion with respect to Bill C-311, which alone is a bad bill, and now the motion proposes to split it and make two bad bills from the same one.

I am very concerned for a number of reasons. One is that one of the bills that is proposed would short-circuit fulsome debate on very serious matters by restricting the amount of time available to committee members. That is a very serious thing.

Just today after the hearing opened on Bill C-311, the committee heard from Bob Page, who is the chair of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy. He said some very important things.

Primary among them, he said that industry or manufacturing in Ontario would be particularly hard hit by a bill like Bill C-311. We can see evidence that this is a bad bill and of course that is one of the reasons we need to debate it in a fulsome measure. It is one of the reasons I will be voting against this motion.

That brings up the question, of what Bill C-311 or what these two incarnations of it ultimately mean to the auto industry, which is a very significant question and one in which, I will remind the New Democrats, the taxpayers of this country are sharing in a very critical time, through a difficult restructuring of the industry in the hopes of having a good future for that industry to the tune of $10 billion. That is a very significant investment, one which the taxpayers deserve a return on investment for, instead of another kick to the industry, hoping to take it down, as the NDP is proposing to do.

Since the New Democrat MPs from Windsor West and Windsor—Tecumseh will not stand in their places and stand up for the auto industry by voting against this motion or against Bill C-311, I am going to have to do it.

I should point out for the record I am not surprised that those two NDP members would be voting against the auto industry by supporting this motion. They have a history of voting against the priorities of the Windsor-Essex region. They voted against the historic infrastructure stimulus funding that we have just announced. They have voted against billions of dollars, potentially, for a new border crossing for our region that would be good for the auto industry and its economic competitiveness, and of course they voted against the automotive aid itself.

Why do we need to consider this? We heard Mr. Page today in committee very clearly say that harmonization is the important way to go with respect to our targets and actions. He said harmonization was important because the economic competitiveness or the cost of operating will be a serious consideration for industry and where it locates. If we take a position that is clearly isolated from not only the United States but other major industrial countries in the world, that would be horrible for industry and the future of blue collar workers in this country.

What did he say? We also need to consider this in light of the fact that we are in tough economic times. That changes the affordability question for a lot of industries moving forward. Mr. Page said that we have to consider whether appropriate technologies required to reduce emissions can be deployed quickly enough. That is a serious consideration for the auto industry.

I am surprised that the NDP, which has long pretended to stand up for blue collar workers in this country, would turn its back on them with an irresponsible and bad bill like this. It is bad. It puts the future of the auto industry in serious jeopardy in this country. Shame on it. I expect NDP members to stand in their place and vote against this motion.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Madam Speaker, I would like to commend the member for his very thoughtful and very informed speech on Bill C-311. He is to be commended for the hard work he has done on the issue of climate change for the entire time he has been in office in this House, and I thank him.

I would like to ask the member if he could elaborate on the issue that the Conservatives keep raising, that we should be moving in sync on policy with our trading partners. If that is the case, then why are we not following the moves of our trading partner Japan, which we are inviting to our country for the G20, and our trading partner Britain, which we are inviting to our country as part of the G20?

The United Kingdom has announced a target of 26% by 2020. Japan has announced a target of 25% by 2020. Yes, indeed, it is true, the targets that were issued originally by the inter-party panel are being questioned. The inter-party panel in this year's report is saying that those targets are not strict enough. They are not deep enough. We are going to have to do more.

The International Energy Agency has said the way out of the economic recession around the world, the way to address climate change simultaneously is to shift investment towards a new green economy. What is the prime trigger? It is regulation. Where is the legislation that this House has tabled? Where are the regulations that this minister has tabled? Even Shell Canada asked yesterday, “Where are the regulations?”

I would appreciate the member's response.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment]

Madam Speaker, I listened intently to my colleague from the Bloc and I have a question for him.

He has listened to the same testimony that I have been listening to at committee. We have heard that Bill C-377, now Bill C-311, is no longer relevant. It actually is a bad bill that opposition members are trying to divide and make into two bad bills. It sets targets that were before the global economic recession, targets that would be harmful to the Canadian economy. That is why the NDP leader said that it should be costed. It has not been costed yet and yet we have the Bloc members supporting these random targets that are no longer relevant.

We have also heard from testimony today from science the importance of having a harmonized, continental approach to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It is not possible to do it in isolation. He should well know that because climate change is not a Canada issue. it is a global issue.

Why would the member want to do something in isolation from what the rest of the world is doing? Why does he have a history of not supporting good environmental programs? Why has he voted against carbon capture and storage in this House? Why has he voted against renewable fuels?

Why do those members just talk the talk but never walk the walk?

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to speak today to the motion presented by my colleague from Vancouver East. The motion seeks to divide Bill C-311, An Act to ensure Canada assumes its responsibilities in preventing dangerous climate change.

A little context is needed to explain why we are looking at Bill C-311 today. I was in Kyoto in 1997. When I was elected 12 years ago to this House, that was one of the first parliamentary missions I went on in 1997 and it allowed me to better understand climate change and its impact not only on the environment, but also on future economic systems.

I remember the debates we had in the House. We had the Liberal Party on the other side of the House and on this side, the official opposition's side, we had members from the Canadian Alliance, not the Conservative Party but the Canadian Alliance, which later became the Reform Party and then the Progressive Conservative Party. It ended up dropping the word “progressive” and simply became the Conservative Party. Nonetheless, throughout all these name changes, which are just superficial changes, the fundamental political philosophy of that party's members stayed the same. In other words, the members, who are now the government, do not believe or have a hard time believing in the very existence of climate change.

I remember in 1997 the debates we had here in this House when the members of the Canadian Alliance denied the existence of climate change. They thought climate change was a natural phenomenon, that mankind was not responsible for the increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and that human activity was not responsible for the chaos that was to come a few years later.

Twelve years later, the impact of climate change is omnipresent. Extreme weather events take place constantly and spontaneously and are recurrent in certain areas, Asia and Indonesia for example. Consequently, on the basis of the scientific reports of the International Panel for Climate Change, it is with confidence that we can officially state today in this House, 12 years later, that the Canadian Alliance, the Reform Party and the current government were wrong and that in 99% of cases, global warming is caused by human activity.

I am returning to that moment in time because it is the very basis for this government's political position on the fight against climate change. Today, what we are first asking this government to do is to recognize that in the next few years we must prevent temperatures from rising more than 2 ^oC above pre-industrial era temperatures.

According to the models and figures presented by the International Panel for Climate Change, temperatures could increase by 3 to 4%. Scientists are telling us that if temperatures rise by more than 2^o C, our climate could run amok. That is at the very core of the bill being introduced. Bill C-311 clearly states in the preamble that Canadian targets, plans, policies and programs to combat climate change must be based on scientific facts and evidence. That is the first thing. There is proof that the government does not acknowledge these scientific facts. I have probably attended 10 international climate change conferences and Canada has tried to trivialize the reports of the International Panel for Climate Change. The government wants these reports to be a mere addendum; it wants to hide them. Why?

Quite simply because the government does not want to follow the scientists' second recommendation, which says that to limit the rise in global temperature to 2 ^oC above that of the pre-industrial period, industrialized nations must reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 25% to 40% relative to 1990 levels by 2020. That is the commitment Canada should make today. Instead of trying to set aside Bill C-311 on the pretext that it makes no sense, the government should first recognize the scientific evidence, then make a commitment to reduce emissions, as the scientists suggest.

But what is the government proposing to do? First, it is proposing to use 2005 or 2006 as the base year, instead of 1990. Moreover, instead of setting absolute greenhouse gas emission reduction targets, it is proposing to set targets per unit of production. But the problem with this approach is that, although we may reduce our emissions per unit of production, if production goes up, emissions will as well. It does not take a degree in math and econometrics to understand this model.

Why does the government want to use 2005 or 2006 as the base year? Why is it refusing to set absolute targets, preferring intensity targets instead? The answer is simple: it wants to protect certain political, electoral and economic interests, primarily in western Canada. The government's measures are designed to protect the oil sands industry, which creates so much pollution that Canada ranks as one of the worst polluters on the planet in the national reports submitted to the conference of the parties on climate change.

The government believes that science-based targets would come at a disastrous economic cost, as it stated again recently. But the government does not understand one thing: the economy and the environment are connected, and any dramatic change in our ecosystems, especially fragile ones, as a result of higher temperatures will have a direct impact on our economic life.

Developing countries are often food producers; they produce many agricultural products. This morning I was again reading a study by the International Food Policy Research Institute, which estimates that climate change will have a direct impact on what we eat. The price of wheat is expected to increase by 194%, and that of rice by 121%. Yields of these two crops will decrease by 30% and 15% respectively.

So imposing strict rules to fight climate change is not what will cause an economic catastrophe, but rather inaction. Indeed, it will jeopardize our ecosystems. We risk seeing a considerable increase in the price of food. Who will pay for this price increase? It certainly will not be the oil industry; it will be the citizens of Rosemont and Hochelaga-Maisonneuve. They will be the ones to pay, because their government did not act responsibly. There are costs associated with inaction, and the government, which for years has been boasting about its economic ideas, has failed to see the models that have been presented.

What are we asking of the government today? We are asking the government to pull itself together, be a world leader, and look at what is happening to the south. The government wants to take a continental approach to fighting climate change; so be it.

Consider, for example, the plan proposed last week by Senator Kerry and Senator Boxer to fight climate change. They are proposing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 7% below 1990 levels, while this government is proposing reductions of 3%.

Look at the Obama and Harper plans proposed so far.

Madam Speaker, I am talking about the plan, not about the Prime Minister. I called the plan—

[Merv Tweed, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to make some remarks today with regard to Bill C-311.

Based on the debate we have had so far today and what I have been able to listen to and participate in, it would suggest to me that everyone has their own vision or view of what history might have been or what history was. I would like to take a brief moment to discuss some of that before moving into my comments, and I will make them relevant to the topic we are discussing.

I found it interesting that members opposite have presented Canadians with two different environmental packages over the last several years. They signed the Kyoto agreement, which they had no intention of doing. It was a last minute thought. Then, just to confirm what one of my hon. colleagues said, it was reported by a man who was very close to those discussions and to that debate, that in reality it was to present a signature of agreement to something they had actually no intention of following through with and no intention of implementing.

We only need to look back at the history to find out that is actually true. After signing the Kyoto accord, the government of that day did nothing to move the ball forward. The Liberals talk today about plans and directions. I recognize and our government recognizes that it takes a lot of discussion and a lot of understanding but what happened during that period was merely lip service paid to the public and to the environmentalists with actually no plan or no outcomes set to measure the success.

The Liberals also talked about plans that were presented. I can think of the Kelowna accord. They talked about an agreement they had with our aboriginal communities but there was no plan. They proposed it as a plan but it was only a news release at the last minute on the dying bed of the government of that day. We knew, and I believe the Canadian public knew, that there would be no plan or no direction following that agreement. It was just merely window dressing prior to an election call.

The member opposite talked about an environmental plan that the Liberals put forward in the last election, 2008. Again, the people of Canada rejected that plan. Why did they reject it? They rejected because they saw it purely as a tax on consumers at a time when consumers were starting to face an economic recession that the world was going through and that was moving its way slowly to Canada. It was rejected simply because it was merely an idea with no meat on the bones, no structure to what they were actually trying to do and it made it very difficult. I would challenge all the members opposite who were fortunate enough to be elected to stand up and say that they could actually explain it to the people they talked to when they were door knocking. That became their biggest issue as far as the campaign.

I do want to talk mostly today in relation to Canada's relationship with the United States. It is very easy to say that Canada can move forward on these types of international agreements without working closely with our neighbours. It needs to be understood that with over 80% of the trade that now takes place between Canada and the United States, everything that we do impacts another industry, another part of our country, just as when the Americans implement something to effect change in one area of their industry, it flows back to Canada and impacts us, not always negatively but in a lot of cases the implications are not what we anticipated or thought about. Therefore, at times we need to go back and review what was introduced, review how it was proposed and then massage it to make it work. It is important to have negotiations and it is important that we share the same economic space.

We are, in my mind, a North American economy. I have had the great pleasure of living within 20 minutes of the United States border. I grew up where the people in North Dakota were my neighbours and my friends. The only difference that we actually had was the difference in a dollar and a border that said this is where our country begins and the other one ends.

Therefore, I think it is very important that we pay attention. I think the members of the Bloc have raised the issue. We cannot move forward without the co-operation and participation of every province. That again takes time.

I think we have all come to the conclusion that it is important and necessary that we move on climate change, and that we accept the facts that we all have to pull in the same direction to make it move forward. If we do not do that, people may feel better about their achievements but the actual accomplishment by the collective group is just not there. That is why we need those negotiations to take place. That is why we have spent a lot of time participating in those negotiations.

The opposition talks about the new President of the United States. I think we are all prepared to give him the time that is required to put the people whom he needs in place to move the ball forward on this particular issue but also to create and establish that relationship with their neighbours.

I would suspect that this same type of discussion is taking place within their chambers, in the sense that, “What we do we have to do as an economic partnership with Canada. We share the same environmental spaces so what we do is going to impact their economy and their environment. So why would we not sit down, make some decisions together, make some decisions and a plan that we can move forward with, develop together, and present it when the time comes to the rest of the world”.

We know our dependence on each other for trade and financial markets. Again, it is something that we all have to be aware of. We have seen in this global economic recession where some economies are starting to move forward, although very slowly and very cautiously, but in the same breath, to impose something on any of these countries at this particular time, Canada along with the U.S. must be very careful about what those outcomes would bring.

Yes, we can stand up, as we have seen members opposite, and announce grandiose plans as to what we are going to do or what they would suggest we do with the environment. Even with a plan that they say they will bring forward at some point in time, we have to look at what the impacts are going to be on our economy and on our country at this particular point in time. If we do not do that we are wearing blinders and we are going to wake up a few years from now and wonder what decisions we actually took on this day and how it is impacting us into the future.

On the supply chains of food, of product and of manufactured goods back and forth with the American economy, no one knows better than I the difficulties we have with supply chains and getting them moving north and south. We have almost the same types of challenges moving them east and west in Canada with trade barriers set up by the provinces, but collectively they have started as individuals and now as groups of provinces. They have started to recognize that the benefits and the outcomes will be better simply because there is an agreement that they want to move forward with, not one moving forward and trying to drag the others through or one denying that they should not move forward and holding everyone back.

I think we have seen that very well, particularly in the western provinces. B.C., Alberta and Saskatchewan have now eliminated the labour barriers for trade. People can now move from one province to the other without having any special provincial designation. I think that creates an opportunity in the economy for our workers who in certain parts of the country are under great duress through no fault of their own. It would allow them, if they choose, to move to an area where there is opportunity right now and a chance for other opportunities in their careers.

On regulation, there should be a balance in what we do to regulate Canadians and what our friends to the south do. There should be an agreement to work within certain parameters, so that one country's movements do not impact the other country's movements, particularly on environmental issues, in a negative way.

Within the climate change strategy, the economic reality is that we just simply cannot ignore our American neighbours. We must look at it as a North American economy, and we must ensure that it is integrated in many of the aspects of our communities, and particularly in the environmental issues that we are discussing today.

We must harmonize our principles. We all have to have a set of principles that we would agree to and work within. We would have to have a policy design that we can actually understand and have input in to changing and updating as things move together, but we cannot do that independent of the Americans, just as I suspect they are not trying to do it independent of us.

If members opposite choose to look at all of the discussions that have taken place on this issue, including the years before that were mentioned, the years of planning that I would say did not produce the results that Canadians wanted, we can see results starting to move froward. I think over time we are going to see a very unified position come forward under the North American banner. It will be Canada and U.S. leading the way, and being the example for other countries to follow.

Members opposite have criticized the government for choosing one area of the environment over the other. I do not believe that is true, but it certainly makes good fodder for the media and it certainly makes good politics. At the end of the day, the engine that drives our economy right now, although suffering as many industries are in the global economic recession, is still the engine that is driving our economy right now. We would be foolish to think that we could move forward strictly on an environmental policy that would impact it in the drastic way that the members opposite would suggest.

We must develop a policy of climate change that facilitates the move across every sector and every region. I think we are all in agreement that we are heading toward a low carbon economy. We have obviously seen that with the investments that many countries in the world, not just in North America, have moved to with more fuel efficient vehicles and more fuel efficient appliances. Everything we do now is geared to being more energy efficient and in the same breath that is the benefit for the economy.

Now, if we had a policy that was North American, it would broaden the ability of countries to become more energy efficient and more environmentally friendly in a very quick way.

I would like to point out that a comment was made about the homeowners tax plan in the sense that if an investment is made in the home, where would that fit into the environmental policy. In my communities many people are making their homes more efficient, therefore using less energy to heat them, less energy to light them. They are benefiting from it by putting value back into their homes, but they are also benefiting all of us here and I would say all Canadians.

We can talk about the big picture and all the great things that we could do but if we all did just a little bit, it might help move that ball forward quicker. When I think of growing up, the best environmentalists I can remember were my grandparents and my aunts and uncles. They used everything to the nth degree. We have kind of fallen away from that. We have become consumers as opposed to people who perhaps should look at what they are buying, how they are using it, and what they do with it when they are finished using it. Not so long ago, and I would suggest as little as 30 years ago, very little got thrown out. Most things got used for one purpose or another in the home until it had no value. I think we can only look back sometimes to find the real leaders in protecting our environment.

The calls for greenhouse gas emission reductions and related measures that weigh out evenly with economic growth and prosperity is what we are all trying to do. We want to balance opportunities for economic growth and I believe there is tremendous opportunity in the economic field on environmental issues. We have seen that. We have seen organizations and companies looking at Canada and the message they get or that we have to sell them is the fact that Canada believes and is moving forward on improving our environment, and the fact that it would be a great place for them to invest and a great place to move their businesses.

Our government believes that the harmonized policy between Canada and the United States offers us, and I say that selfishly, but I mean all Canadians, the best opportunity to meet, in a consolidated and uniform way, the economic environmental challenges of our times. We all know and we all recognize that these are not simple issues.

Where Canada is concerned, we are particularly challenged because of our size. Obviously, we have a vast amount of land to cover and, traditionally, our climate plays a big role. As they say in Manitoba, we have nine months of winter and three months of construction. It is close to the truth in a lot of cases.

We talk about things that work in other countries and things that other countries are doing. While I think that is admirable and I think that is something that we should always be doing and trying to measure our successes based on others, we must recognize that there are some obstacles in our place that do not allow us to move quite as quickly or in quite the same manner as other countries might. We must also realize that because of that, our reliance on energy production and natural resources is very great.

Members opposite had talked about an electrical hydro grid east and west. While I support that, I think that we have to look at the economics and the benefits of it, and all those have to be weighed into the outcome of what we should or should not do at a particular time.

We, in Canada, account for 2% of the global greenhouse gas emissions, yet we are also the seventh largest emitter. I think that is something that we have to always be aware of and always be working to lower that number. It is simply because we are a commodity-based economy and arguably the most energy consumptive of any society in the world. I think that is obviously an opportunity for us to do things better. It is not a knock; it is just simply a reality of where we live and the geographical circumstances that we live within. Canada is large and Canada is cold. Those are two things that we just cannot change.

However, what we can do is concentrate on what we can change; that is, the key link between Canada and the United States environmental and economic policies, the supply and the use of energy. We have made great strides in working with our neighbours to the south in coming to those solutions.

Again, it has been said by everyone here, and everyone would agree, that energy is the key driver of our economies, and our future prosperity and growth depends upon it. What that energy will be, I think, has to be debated, but nonetheless, because of our size, because of our climate, it is important that our integrated economies result in energy flows across Canada and the U.S. That fact alone means that having cleaner sources of energy is imperative when it comes to taming as complex an issue as climate change.

I have many more things to suggest, but I understand that my time is wrapping up. I would just like to end by pointing out a few that we have done.

We certainly support the renewable energy technologies. We are looking at all sorts of fuels, wind and water energies. I think it is important to always keep in mind, though, that things that we do in Canada only double or grow in size if we work collectively with our neighbours to the south in developing a policy that works for North America.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Dr. Page, thank you so much for being here. It's a shame that we couldn't hear more from you.

Maybe we can hear from Dr. Page further, Mr. Chair.

Doctor, as you are well aware, Canada's clean energy dialogue has been ongoing with the United States starting at the beginning of the year and we are moving forward on a harmonized continental approach. On the costing of our commitment of a 20% reduction below 2006 levels by 2020, you said yourself it was quite challenging. Could you expand on the economic consequences of putting in place Bill C-311? What would it do to the economy to have emissions reduced by 25% below 1990 levels, and would it be possible to have a harmonized approach with the United States if we went in that direction?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, regarding Bill C-311 and this particular topic in general, it should be no surprise to the member or anyone in the House that the Conservative government would be in the pockets of the oil industry.

In fact, the government has ignored its own member, the Minister of State for Democratic Reform , who supports an east-west power grid, which he has spoken about before, which would send Manitoba's clean electrical power to Ontario to retire the coal plants in Ontario. The government even ignores its own member and prefers to promote a nuclear alternative which it knows could take years and years to get approval.

Why does the government not deal in concrete matters on this issue and promote the east-west power grid as a start to help push this file along?

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, my response to my hon. colleague's objection is the following.

I sit on the environment committee and I make a point of working hard to promote environmental issues. Now I will be faced with letters from constituents. Some of them will be from British Columbia because I received many phone calls from British Columbia late last week about Bill C-311. It was obviously part of a lobby campaign but I am not sure exactly where it originated. However, I will be receiving phone calls and letters from people who will ask me why I voted against Bill C-311.

Even if I am speaking in support of Bill C-311 today, it will be very hard for me to respond to those criticisms because I will not be able to tell these people what happened during committee. I will not even be able to tell people who call my office or who write to me how I voted because it is an in camera meeting and to do that would be a breach of Parliament. Now I have been put in a compromised situation.

I accept the apology of the hon. House leader of the NDP. However, I wish to use this opportunity to set the record straight. I am in support of setting objectives that will guide the government, hopefully, toward action on climate change, but I have very little faith in the ability of the government to actually take this issue seriously.

If we look at the United States, as part of its stimulus package the United States will be spending 14 times more per capita on renewable energy than we in Canada today. The government can try to say that it is waiting for the United States to act before it knows what to do because obviously it is at a loss and does not know what to do. Four years later, after being elected in 2006, it still has not figured out the climate change issue. It can hide behind the excuse that it must wait for our neighbours to the south to act, but they are already spending 14 times more per capita on renewable energies than we are.

The government cannot have it both ways. It cannot say that it has to wait on the one hand for action and then say that it is taking action but that it still cannot act on renewable energy.

Here is what I fear in the government's approach and what I fear if we do not prod and push the obstinate, stubborn government to take meaningful action on climate change. I fear Canada will fall behind.

The United States has the most dynamic economy in the world. It may not be performing as strongly as other economies at the moment but it is one of the most dynamic, creative and innovative countries in the world, and it is already working on the technologies of tomorrow and on the solutions to climate change. it may not have passed a bill yet in Congress or taken a position vis-à-vis Copenhagen yet, but it is working on it on the ground while we sit back and twiddle our thumbs waiting for the Americans to issue a press release.

Maybe that is a reflex of a government that governs by press releases. Maybe a press release is the only reality the government knows. I would suggest that the government should not wait for a press release from the White House. It should start investing now in the technologies of tomorrow, in the technologies that will allow us to save energy and be more competitive on the world markets. It should act now if it wants Canada to be at the forefront of economic development moving forward into the 21st century.

It is not enough to say, “Let us wait on the Americans”. Otherwise we can use that argument all the way down the line. We could say that before we take any action on health care, we will wait for the Americans to sort out their problems.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, this is a very important debate. It is an ongoing debate about how Canada will respond to one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century and beyond. It is also a debate about continued government inaction on the extraordinary challenge that we face as a nation and as a world.

I would like to go back, if I may, to 2005-06 since members of the government like to bring up that time period over and over again, a bit like a broken record.

I recall that in 2005, after extensive consultations with industry and environmental groups, the same environmental groups this time around which the Conservative government has left waiting in the reception area. We have a government that seems stubbornly committed to not having any kind of dialogue with Canada's environmental groups.

After extensive consultations with Canadian civil society, the Liberal government had a regulatory package waiting to be unveiled. That regulatory package would have helped Canada meet its Kyoto targets and, more importantly, would have helped Canada spur its economy toward the kinds of investments in green technologies that would be required not only to solve environmental problems but to provide jobs for Canadians. Right before the package was unveiled, the NDP, along with the Bloc Québécois and the Conservatives pulled the plug on the Liberal government at that time.

There was a plan that was ready to go. It was a plan based on consultation. In the election campaign that ensued, we heard a lot of self-righteous talk from the Conservative opposition at the time saying, “Just wait and see. Once we take over the controls of the government, there will be action. We will achieve things and produce results”. Here we are four years later and there are still no climate change regulations.

The government has been somewhat fortunate that in the interim the United States elected a new president and now it can hide behind the president's climate change plan. Until the Congress of the United States puts together something on climate change, the current government will obviously not produce much on this issue.

It is very important that we act on this issue. The impact of climate change is vast. Even though we have a lot of scientific evidence, we still do not understand exactly how climate change will impact our water systems. We do not understand how climate change will impact our oceans. We have an idea, but there is still a lot of work to be done.

At this point, we should still move ahead. If the government will not move ahead, it is up to Parliament to force it to start laying out some greenhouse gas emissions objectives. It is our duty as parliamentarians to do that.

It is very unfortunate, as we know, that earlier this week there was an in camera meeting of the House of Commons environment committee on the subject of Bill C-311. The result of a vote in that in camera meeting was unveiled by the NDP in advance of when the report of that committee was tabled in the House, which obviously was a breach of trust.

It is very important that we learn to work together in trust because a committee of Parliament in this corner of the world—