Bill C-288 (Historical)

Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act

An Act to ensure Canada meets its global climate change obligations under the Kyoto Protocol

The purpose of this enactment is to ensure that Canada meets its global climate change obligations under the Kyoto Protocol. It requires the Minister of the Environment to establish an annual Climate Change Plan and to make regulations respecting climate change. It also requires the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy to advise the Minister — to the extent that it is within its purpose — on the effectiveness of the plans, and requires the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development to submit to the Speaker of the House of Commons a report of the progress in the implementation of the plans.

[John Godfrey, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Thanks to all of the witnesses.

It's certainly been a morning rich in presentations and in contradictions, and I suspect we're going to be exploring those contradictions over the course of the morning.

I'm looking forward to hearing Mr. Guilbeault talk in more detail, in response to Ms. Donnelly and Mr. Alvarez, but I'd like to begin with the commissioner.

I very much appreciated your presentation. In a sense, I think we had this conversation when you initially released your report for 2006 on climate change.

If I may return to Bill C-288, the whole point of this bill is to actually increase accountability and, in the spirit of your suggestions, to attempt to better define roles, responsibilities, and authorities so as to understand the performance of policies and programs and to monitor and report broader objectives. The language is picked up in regard to our obligations under the Kyoto agreement.

I know the Auditor General had some issues concerning the role that was proposed for your office under the legislation. I think we will be taking it into account in our amendments, which will suggest that some of the things we originally thought you might do might instead be done by the National Round Table on the Economy and the Environment and, I hope, would meet the objections.

I'd like to begin in terms of this bill, which recognizes that we have signed the Kyoto agreement and we've been trying to do our best. We need a plan and we need to understand what is expected from each element in terms of greenhouse gas reductions and how we're doing each year.

Does this bill go in a direction that helps to answer some of the suggestions you've made both in your report and in your remarks today?

[Aldyen Donnelly, President, Greenhouse Emissions Management Consortium]

Thank you for having me. I'll try to be quick.

I'd like to point the committee in a different direction than prior witnesses have. I've enjoyed reading the blues, and for a change, I've decided not to cover ground that others have covered before me.

For a bit of background, GEMCo is a not-for-profit consortium of Canadian large emitters. The large emitters join GEMCo to share in the process of learning how to trade carbon credits, how to manage their inventories, and how to develop business strategies to accommodate a carbon-constrained future. GEMCo has existed since 1995. A typical Canadian company belongs to GEMCo for three or four years and then moves on. At any point in time, GEMCo companies are competitors. They don't like each other very much. They share in the cost of learning. As soon as they feel they've reached a certain threshold, the last thing they want to do is talk to each other about how they're going to approach the carbon market competitively.

Together, GEMCo and its members have fought carbon credits and greenhouse gas credits speculatively in the carbon market since 1995. Our market activity is much reduced now compared to years past. But because of our historical activity, I'm still the largest carbon credit buyer in Canada and the third largest in the world.

Having said that, it tells you more about how little real market activity is happening than about how large an influence I am in the market. To put our current level of activity together this year, which has been a slow year, by the end of the year, we and our members will have firmly contracted to acquire 350,000 tonnes of future greenhouse gas reductions from Canadian landfill gas operators, and we will have optioned another 350,000 tonnes. And this will be our smallest year for commercial activity.

The principal goal of our commercial work is not to scoop the market, but to learn how the market should work, and will work, before we're stuck in it. You'll find that we have recommendations or ideas that are fundamentally different from what you may hear from many others. I think the difference between our recommendations or views and others is based on our commercial experience.

I have two other points. I put together the very first agriculture biological sequestration credit trade in the world in 1998. Prior to our putting together that transaction, which committed us to buy 2.8 million tonnes of carbon credits from 137 farmers, Canada's position was opposed to recognizing soil carbon gains. Our sole purpose in doing that one transaction was to prove that you should change your position. In 2001, I put together the first ever CO₂ injection enhanced oil recovery carbon credit trade. It's not about to be done. We did a 700,000-tonne deal in 2002, where we are financing a CO₂ injection project in the Texas panhandle.

Based on those experiences, I guess my punchline is--and I should say that my views don't necessarily represent my members or speak for all of industry; I've already described our group as diverse--if this Parliament passes Bill C-288, you're sending a strong signal to industry that you still don't know where you're going. It's pretty reasonable to predict that if you pass Bill C-288, the civil service and the politicians will be thrown into a six-month tizzy of writing reports--on the one side why, and on another side why not, you can achieve the Kyoto targets. That adds six months to a schedule that we're already behind on--at least six months.

The question I would ask you to ask yourselves is what you need to move forward. We're revisiting an old topic.

What we've handed out is a two-pager, in two languages, that has my key messages. I apologize to those of you who are French speaking. At the last minute, I also decided to hand out the speaking notes I made for myself, because I have tables and data in my speaking notes that you might find useful.

The bottom line is that when you look at the speaking notes, you'll see that in the international market, before accounting for Russian hot air, the Kyoto Protocol created a massively oversupplied quota market. At the end of 2004, the global greenhouse gas quota supply, created under the Kyoto Protocol, exceeds the maximum physical capacity of the countries covered by the emissions quota supply by 1.7 billion tonnes.

To go at this number in a different way, assuming that Canada has to enter the international market to buy 1 billion tonnes to meet our Kyoto commitment, after we withdraw the required billion tonnes from the Kyoto market, there's still 1.75 billion extra quota units out there. As well if the CDM/JI board keeps approving projects at its current rate, another billion tonnes of excess quota units will added to the market.

To use up all of the Kyoto limit, every nation in the world would have to increase its greenhouse gas emissions at a rate of 4.5% per year from now on. In other words, there's no cap; it's a false market, and we don't know why Canada wants to participate in this market.

The Kyoto Protocol is a trade agreement; it is not an environmental agreement. The Montreal Protocol is a fine example of a very effective environmental agreement. I was surprised to see that witnesses before me actually described the Montreal Protocol and Kyoto Protocol as parallel. They couldn't be more different. If you want to know what an effective international greenhouse gas treaty looks like, it looks like the Montreal Protocol, and it doesn't look anything like the Kyoto Protocol.

So my view is that from today on, our Parliament has to step back and say, what do we do next? We have two options. One is to re-enter the Kyoto process, recognizing the serious implications of Kyoto as a trade agreement, as a trade treaty—as an unprecedented historical attempt to create a new global quota regime that fundamentally changes how national economies work. Or we can walk out of Kyoto and be the country that steps back on the international scene and tells the world what the Montreal Protocol for greenhouse gases looks like.

In previous hearings, I heard one member of Parliament ask at least twice why Canada thinks we could influence anybody in this regard, since we're so small. Read my lips: if we walk out of the fake Kyoto market, it crashes. It's in oversupply. There are only three buyers, if you take the European Union as a bloc. Everybody is in oversupply except Japan, New Zealand, and Canada. We walk; we call the shots. Don't lose this opportunity.

When you go through my speaking notes, you'll see that domestically, if we were going to walk, the first thing to do is to sit down to seriously develop and reach consensus on a greenhouse gas budget for Canada that applies to the years 2008 through 2050—not 2008 through 2012, not 2050, but 2008 through 2050, which I must admit I read as the intention in the recently tabled notice to regulate. I understand that others don't read this notice as having that intention.

In my document, you'll see that I'm trying to encourage you to think of our getting into a process in Canada where we agree to a budget. We don't think of that budget as 500 million tonnes or 700 million tonnes a year. It's 19 billion tonnes of Canadian right to discharge into the environment from 2008 to 2050, or 23 billion tonnes, or 26 billion tonnes. It's a budget for a long period.

You liberate yourself when you think that way, because when you step back for any budget over such a period, you can create a whole series of targets and timetables that don't exceed the budget. You can also put costs on, because 23 billion tonnes between 2008 and 2050 has the same impact on the upper atmosphere, whether you discharge a bunch of it in the first or the last part of the period, as long as you don't go over. Because every time you put CO₂ up, it stays up there for 150 years. You're not making a significant difference in timing.

So the question is, what's our firm long-term budget? Then given our firm long-term budget, given our economy and the sectors, now taking exactly Pierre's advice, what is the most effective set of targets and timetables, starting with firm, binding targets in 2015 at the latest and ratcheting down every five years to 2050? How do we get to that budget?

I want to step back, and I'll stop here, but one person asked me to tell you what I thought keeping the Kyoto commitment would cost. My position is that we can comply with Kyoto, and to estimate what it would cost, let's assume Canada accepts a very stringent 2008 through 2050 emissions budget. Let's assume that budget we've accepted equates to a straight line from 2008--actual emission levels down to 80% below 1990 levels in 2050. That equates to a budget for Canada of 19-plus billion tonnes over those years. I modelled the least-cost Canadian path toward living with that budget and then I modelled what living with that budget and complying with the Kyoto target and timetable would cost.

So I am suggesting that the differential between those two costs is the cost of that one compliance obligation, the Kyoto Protocol. My estimate is that that cost is a minimum of $26 billion, and it can reach $38 billion. All you buy for that increment is perceived reputational gain.

Our reputation is in tatters because we didn't recognize that Kyoto is a trade agreement and not an environment agreement. We can recover our reputation by returning the world to a Montreal Protocol type of approach to greenhouse gases.

[Pierre Alvarez, President, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

We greatly appreciate the efforts of the clerk to accommodate us on the schedule. Considering the subject of today's committee hearing, the fact that we're doing this by video conference, I think, is appropriate.

CAPP is the industry association representing about 150 companies and 98% of the production here in Canada from the east coast to the north. I am the president of the association, and with me today is Rick Hyndman, senior policy adviser, who has been involved in this climate change file since the beginning.

Bill C-288 is about the relationship between Canada's near-term action on greenhouse gas emissions and the country's Kyoto target. In essence, should Canada's Kyoto target be the guiding star for our initial GHG policy step? We think not. Looking at what the world and Canada have to do to make significant reductions in GHG emissions over the next half-century leads to the conclusion that focusing on Canada's Kyoto target would be a mistake. It would continue to divert the country from getting on with what needs to be done to arguing over who is going to pay for foreign credits.

The short note we sent you yesterday takes us through some of the questions in that regard, and I will address a few of them in short form today.

First, what should Canada be doing about GHG emissions from now to 2050? The concept of emission reduction wedges is now familiar to almost everyone debating near-term GHG policies and is being explored by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy as a framework for action in this country. The wedge concept emphasizes the need to begin action in several key areas, areas that can stabilize global emissions through major reductions in the developed world and slow growth in emissions in industrialized countries with rapidly rising energy demands. These areas include energy efficiency and conservation throughout the economy; carbon dioxide capture and storage; in this country, coal-fired electricity, oil sands production and upgrading, and some chemical production; renewable electricity and fuels; nuclear power; fuel switching and cogeneration; and forest and agricultural sinks.

The value of the wedge pictures of what can be accomplished by 2050 is the focus it brings to assessing actual actions and the policies required to make them happen. Policies now, initial actions now, investing in technology development now--but recognizing that results will take time.

Two, how can we get going? As was just indicated by the commissioner, we need to identify, analyze, and compare costs in deciding on actions and then pursue them. We need to move ahead where and when ready, and we need to take acceptable, affordable initial steps, get going, build on success, and increase our effort over time with other countries.

Three, what should the policies be for an initial step? To begin with, the federal government and the provinces need to work together in designing policies and programs for emissions across the country. Some of these are ready, or almost ready, and others will take some time.

One area where considerable work has been done and is ready for decision and implementation is the GHG intensity target system for large energy-intensive industrial sectors. The work on the target system over the past four years has been guided by principles that are extremely important to us and to many other sectors. These principles include the intensity approach to avoid penalizing economic growth; equivalent treatment across sectors; defined limits on the cost of compliance to address uncertainty and competitiveness; adjustment for increases in GHG intensity driven by compliance with new environmental regulations; phase-in of targets for new facilities; promotion of R and D through a compliance option, such as a technology fund; and efficient, harmonized federal-provincial implementation.

As billions of dollars have been invested and committed on the basis of these principles, they are very important to industry and the investment community. We are hopeful that the current consultation process dealing with completing the design of intensity targets will be successful and that we can move on to implementation early in 2007.

Four, how would properly designed intensity targets advance action on one or more of the wedges? Targets create ongoing pressure on existing facilities across all large energy-intensive industry sectors to improve GHG performance. The defined price compliance option provides for increased investment and advanced technology, again through a technology fund, and step changes can be incorporated into new facilities as they are brought on.

Complementary strategies are needed for key technologies to deliver significant improvements over the medium to long term. A notable example is CCS, carbon dioxide capture and storage. The federal government needs to work with the provincial governments involved in CCS and industry to agree on a strategy and to move forward in this regard.

Five, would committing to implement the Kyoto target in Canada help us contribute to the international effort? The 2050 wedges perspective focuses on required actions. The Kyoto targets focused the world on allocating near-term quantitative national emission targets. Canada's target focused this country on allocating the burden of paying for foreign credits to cover the country's Kyoto gap.

Kyoto targets are all about dividing up a pie. To stretch the analogy, the wedges perspective is about figuring out how to make the pie. The U.S. energy information agency's most recent projection on global emissions by region indicates that, in aggregate, the emissions by countries with Kyoto targets will be below their 1990 levels and close to their aggregate of targets. However, one of the problems with the Kyoto approach is the distribution of those targets. Canada has a target that is over 30% below its trend in emissions in 2010. It would make no sense for Canada to devote billions of dollars to buy credits to reach an artificial target when we need the resources to get us going on the right path for the longer term.

As we've seen by recent international events, the current Kyoto structure has no future. There is growing international recognition of the need to find ways to cooperate on actions that will produce results over time. Another round of debates over how emissions rights should be allocated internationally is a waste of time. It will not succeed. Committing to implement policies to achieve Canada's Kyoto target would set this country back another five years. Remember, we've been at this for a long time now. This country needs to take an initial step in the right direction and get going.

That concludes my remarks, Mr. Chairman. I'd be pleased to take questions later.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

If we could begin, I would ask Mr. Rodriguez to deal with the first item. I believe we decided yesterday we would have clause-by-clause of Bill C-288 on Thursday and then we would go on to CEPA on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday of next week and try to complete it in that period.

Mr. Rodriguez, do you want to say a word about that?

Canada's Clean Air Act

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's first question was on the Kyoto protocol.

Right now in the environment committee we have been debating Bill C-288, which is the Liberal re-enactment of their Kyoto plan.

For 13 years the Liberals did absolutely nothing on the environment. They received a scolding by the Commissioner of the Environment. We have now heard that they are not going to be able to meet those Kyoto targets. This is what our environment minister has said very clearly. We would like to but unfortunately, the situation left by the previous Liberal government has left the environment in a real mess here in Canada.

This government is taking action. We are not going to continue on with the Liberal plan of inaction. We want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. That is part of Bill C-30 that we are debating today.

The experts who have come to the committee have said that we cannot meet those Kyoto targets. We need to set new targets. Those new targets will be set in spring 2007, which is just a few months away.

I encourage the hon. member to work with us to set those targets. Let us have realistic targets that will reduce greenhouse emissions and reduce pollution for the health of all Canadians.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Mr. Warawa, we're not completing it. We're suggesting that this would allow our researchers to come up with a preliminary proposal and recommendations. We would then come back and go through it in depth and could make changes and so on. It's just that we need to know now.

Mr. Cullen, just to quickly bring you up to date, 3:30 to 4:30 on December 11--we're talking about next Monday--the minister is available to come. I'm proposing that we then carry on, on that day, with our regular CEPA meeting and that we extend it by one hour, so that we would then go from 4:30 until 6:30 if necessary. We would then, on Tuesday, the 12th, have our final round table, into which we'd have to bring a group that would represent what we've heard. And then on Thursday the 14th, we would have our meeting to wrap up our directions to Tim, as to the direction he should go. That would let them work on it over the break, and when we came back, we would have those recommendations, that report, which we could then start to work on.

I'm assuming we'll be finished Bill C-288 on the 7th--it can be reported back on then--and we can then carry on for our next week with getting the final report begun for CEPA.

I need unanimous consent in order to tell our clerk that's what we're going to do, and then he can proceed to set up that round table, as our big concern is getting the round table set up.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Well, my only reply would be that Bill C-288 is of course going to be completed, clause-by-clause, most likely on December 7. It can then be reported back to the House.

At this point, I think we have to assume we're here until the 15th. I don't know what else to do. I have no inside knowledge that we won't be here.

For our final round table, it seems to me that if we're going to have a good representation of people testify before us, we need to invite them this week. We can't wait to see what happens on Friday in order to do that. I'm only saying this would allow us to plan.

Mr. Warawa.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

If we could begin the committee meeting, I'd like to welcome our witnesses.

Before that, with the members here, we're going to do some planning. If we're going to do this, we'll probably have to get our clerk started on it right away.

As everyone knows, we will have clause-by-clause for Bill C-288 on December 7, and it should be finished on that day.

I'm assuming the motion will be made tomorrow. I have talked to Mr. Rodriguez about it. It will probably go ahead, and we would finish Bill C-288 on December 7. It would leave us with Monday, December 11, Tuesday, December 12, and Thursday, December 14, available next week.

I would propose that Tim work on the report over Christmas, and when we come back, he would then have a report for us to go through, discuss, change, and so on.

The minister has offered to come from 3:30 to 4:30 on December 11. I would propose that we could extend the meeting, because we would be scheduled to talk about interdepartmental cooperation and legislative overlap for CEPA on that day. We would have the minister on the December 11, and we would then go into the regular CEPA committee for our regular session.

I'll finish this, and then you can see the whole plan.

On December 12, which would be a Tuesday, we would do the final round table, which we would schedule. We'd need to get witnesses for it now, because it's only a week away.

For any questions to the international group that were broken up by the fire alarm, we have their testimony. We don't have the questions, but we could take care of those on that date.

On December 14 we would provide our final recommendations to Tim, and he would then have January to work on those. When the committee comes back, he could have a draft report for us, which we could then discuss, of course, before sending it on to the government.

That's a suggestion. It's not a motion or anything. I would need unanimous consent to go ahead with that approach. It would be largely for planning purposes that we could proceed in that way.

Are there any comments? Mr. Silva.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this bill on air quality would amend three existing statutes, the first of which is the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. Based on our observations, however, these are not new regulatory powers that the government plans to grant itself, because they already exist in the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. The bill would also amend the Energy Efficiency Act. We find it strange that this amendment is being introduced after the EnerGuide program was eliminated. The third part of the bill would amend the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act.

The Bloc Québécois currently supports sending this bill to committee before second reading. In our view, the amendments proposed by Bill C-30 are unnecessary. They would only slow down the process of taking concrete action against climate change. This is simply a delay.

The bill is also accompanied by a notice of intent, which lists the regulations the government intends to adopt over the next few years and the deadlines it has set for doing so. This document shows that the government is starting from scratch and beginning a new round of consultations in three phases leading to new standard that would not be mandatory until 2010.

Bill C-30 in its current form is unacceptable. It practically means the end of the Kyoto protocol objectives. The bill would incorporate into the Canadian Environmental Protection Act the statement that respecting Canada's international commitments on the environment is a matter of government discretion. We agree with referring the bill to committee before second reading because that will give us the latitude we need to consider the admissibility of amendments to this bill.

We will work in good faith in this committee, but the Bloc Québécois will make no compromises because respecting the Kyoto protocol targets is what is important. We will also present amendments to address the fairness of the polluter-pay rule, Canada's respect for its international commitments and, most of all, the urgent need for action to fight climate change. I want to remind hon. members that the Bloc's priority is still Bill C-288, which clearly respects the Kyoto protocol objectives and for which the legislative agenda is controlled by the opposition and not by our government.

Thanks to past investments by the administrators at Hydro-Québec in the area of hydroelectricity, Quebec has a non-polluting electricity production network. Quebec's plan mainly targets transportation and pollution reduction in certain industries.

As far as transportation is concerned, the bill would amend the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act to create the regulatory power to impose mandatory vehicle consumption standards on the industry by 2011, after the voluntary agreement expires. This does not seem soon enough.

The government has announced that Environment Canada and Health Canada also intend to hold detailed consultations with the provinces and industry starting in the fall. This consultation is late. It is planned in three major phases: the first will end in 2007, the second in 2008 and the third in 2010. Therefore, no regulation will come into effect before 2010.

What is important to the Bloc Québécois is that targets are established. These targets are in our report on the evaluation of greenhouse gas emissions.

In 2004, production of greenhouse gases in Quebec was about 12 tonnes per person, or half the average rate of production of 24 tonnes per Canadian. As for the other provinces, per capita emissions totalled almost 69 tonnes in Saskatchewan and 73 tonnes in Alberta, or five to six times greater than in Quebec.

If we compare increases between 1990 and 2004, we note that Quebec emissions have risen by 6% since 1990, compared to 39.4% for Alberta and 61.7% for Saskatchewan.

As I was saying earlier, opting for hydroelectric energy certainly was a significant factor in Quebec's enviable performance. However, the collective choices made by its citizens, industries and the National Assembly also made it possible to achieve these results. The Quebec pulp and paper industry alone reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 18% between 1990 and 2005.

The excellent performance of the Quebec manufacturing sector also made a substantial contribution to Quebec's positive results. Between 1990 and 2003, this sector reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 6.8% and emissions arising from industrial processes by more than 15%. These reductions were made possible by significant strategic investments by Quebec companies in innovative technologies allowing them to improve their processes and their energy efficiency.

The Minister of the Environment refuses to acknowledge the efforts made by Quebec or the value of the Quebec plan. It was again obvious in Nairobi, where she failed to mention Quebec's green plan in her official speech to the international community.

Rather than revise its international obligations by calling the Kyoto protocol into question, the Conservative government must implement the climate change action plan. That was the Bloc Québécois' proposal, founded on the very important principles of equality and polluter pays. With respect to the polluter pays principle, studies have been done on Canada's emissions and it is generally accepted that responsibility for reducing emissions should be shared non-proportionally based on population or gross domestic product. It should be shared by the provinces and the territories. The Bloc Québécois is proposing a three-part approach to distribute the burden across Canada and give each province quotas to comply with.

The European Union succeeded in reaching an agreement on distributing greenhouse gas emissions among 15 European countries. The negotiations took two years to achieve concrete results. Each country has its own targets to reach.

In Canada, negotiations went on for almost five years and were suspended. We have not yet reached a compromise on distributing responsibility among the provinces and territories.

According to this three-part approach, Quebec's goal would be 0% relative to 1990 levels. The province could therefore simply address its 6% increase since 1990 to reach its goal: 1990 production levels.

Other provinces' goals are much higher because of their energy choices.

In conclusion, over the next few weeks, the Bloc Québécois will propose amendments to this bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to participate in the debate on Bill C-30, Canada's clean air act, as the government is calling it. This bill amends three existing acts: the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, the Energy Efficiency Act and the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act.

We have been waiting a long time for the Conservative government to tell us what it plans to do to fight climate change and smog. We waited a long time because up to now, the policies of the Conservative Party, a political party on the verge of taking power more than a year ago, had nothing to offer in terms of measures or an effective plan to respect Canada's commitments under the Kyoto protocol signed in that Japanese city in 1997.

The bill before us here today is a far cry from what we were expecting. First of all, we were expecting a plan and a bill that would integrate the targets for greenhouse gas reductions set out by the Kyoto protocol, especially during the first phase of reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. Similar to Bill C-288, which is currently in committee, we were expecting this bill to include a 6% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions between 2008 and 2012, compared to 1990 rates.

Not only does this nearly 36-page bill never mention Kyoto, it also never refers to this target for reducing greenhouse gases during the first phase of targeted reductions. I would remind the House that this target was endorsed by Canada.

The bill also contains nothing about the second phase of reductions or the government's intentions. The only target the government is proposing here today to fight climate change is a target somewhere between 45% and 65% in greenhouse gas reductions by 2050, as though we can continue to produce greenhouse gases without worrying about short-, medium- and long-term targets for reductions. This is no different than presenting a business plan to a board of directors of a private company—and I wonder what the government would do—with no short- or medium-term goals, but only one objective for 2050.

Personally, I think that board of directors would send its managers back to do their homework, so that they could present a realistic plan that respects the international commitments signed by Canada.

Not only does the bill set a target for 2050, but the reference level for this 45% to 65% reduction in emissions is 2003, rather than 1990 as set out by Kyoto.

What does that mean in reality? It means that we will start calculating the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in 2003, as if nothing happened in the provinces or certain industrial sectors before 2003. Yet the Province of Quebec—sadly, we are just a province, even though we are now a nation—is one of the first provinces to have tabled a plan to fight climate change.

Quebec is prepared to comply with greenhouse gas reduction targets that use 1990 as the reference year. But the government is proposing 2003 as the reference year, as if it were possible to emit more greenhouse gas before 2003. In addition, this bill does not provide for offsetting credits for industrial sectors that have reduced their emissions in relation to 1990 levels.

This bill therefore does not comply with the international commitments signed by Canada. In introducing Bill C-30, Canada has flip-flopped on its international environmental commitments.

This government has also decided to set aside something that is vital to Quebec: the principle of equity. Past efforts by the provinces and territories and by industries should be recognized under the government's bill, yet there is nothing in the bill that does this.

In addition, we are expecting major efforts in transportation, an important sector in Quebec. What is the government proposing? Essentially, it is telling us that the voluntary approach that the government has agreed on with the auto industry can continue on its merry way until 2011. After 2011, the government will consider regulations based not on the most effective criteria and standards in North America—those in California—but on standards comparable to those of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

They have decided, in terms of automobile manufacturing standards, to use lower benchmarks, and thus lower the standards, when Canada should be using its regulations to raise them. Worse yet, we learned just this morning that the government will have two systems for the industrial sectors: one that will be based on the intensity of emissions and another on the absolute reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

It has been decided in Canada to spare the oil and gas industry at the expense of the industrial sectors that have made some efforts in the past. This is the second unfair factor: after the territorial aspect, or the non-recognition of the efforts made by Quebec since 1990, this is unfair to the industrial sector, in that Canada's oil industry is being spared.

We are indeed in favour of referring Bill C-30 to committee, but we believe that fundamental improvements need to be made to this bill. Recognition of the Kyoto targets, especially in the first phase, must be seen in the very essence and spirit, the principle and preamble of the bill.

We need stronger commitments and an immediate plan that will allow us to take action in the second phase of greenhouse gas emissions reduction, a year from now, in Bali, when the international community will begin to reflect on the system that should be applied in this second phase. The only debate we are having in this House is on the reduction objective for 2050.

Let me say again: if executives were to present this plan to a board of directors, they would be sent back to the drawing board to come up with reduction targets for the short, medium and long terms.

I will close by addressing a major aspect that we will defend in the parliamentary committee: this principle of acknowledging the territorial approach. We have not, thus far, been able to achieve our greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets because the proposed plans require reduction from coast to coast and Canada's economic structure differs from one province to another, while Quebec's energy policy also differs from those of the other provinces.

In committee, we will be working on having this territorial approach recognized within Bill C-30.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

I found the papers that you've written—actually Pembina, not you personally—on the oil sands, the tar sands, very interesting.

I visited Fort McMurray to take a look at them, bought the DVDs, and actually met with a representative from Pembina. I was really surprised about their involvement with the development of the tar sands, and I was surprised that they weren't opposing the oil sands, the tar sands; it is one of the major producers of greenhouse gas emissions. Causing the increase in greenhouse emissions, globally, right here in Canada, is our tar sands, and yet Pembina is actively involved in consultation and has not taken a position in opposition to that. I find that ironic.

I also found your comment that Canada had abandoned Kyoto as equating...honestly sharing internationally the condition that Canada finds itself in, saying that we are 35% above the Kyoto targets.... An honest statement reporting the conditions of Canada...because of, according to the environment minister, the lack of leadership--and you were asking for leadership--shown by the previous government. We ended up with a situation where we're 35% above those targets, which is basically what Bill C-288 is trying to reintroduce, a Liberal plan of inaction.

You're supporting this, and you're supporting, it appears to me, reporting honestly that we're above those targets, and that's equated to an abandonment of Kyoto, which is not the case at all, Mr. Bramley. Actually, what the government has done is we've been committed to the Kyoto Protocol right from--

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

The point I'm making is that Pembina has presented itself as being non-partisan and they've come up and said they strongly support Bill C-288.

Do you strongly support Bill C-30?

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Mr. Warawa, perhaps you could specifically try to relate that to Bill C-288. I think that's Mr. Bigras' point.

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

I have a point of order, Mr. Chairman.

I don't think the parliamentary secretary's question has anything to do with Bill C-288, since he has just asked the witness a question about Bill C-30.

[Matthew Bramley]

I think all of the members of Climate Action Network Canada are strong supporters of Bill C-288. To suggest that is partisan--