Bill C-30 (Historical)

Canada's Clean Air Act

An Act to amend the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, the Energy Efficiency Act and the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act (Canada's Clean Air Act)

Part 1 of this enactment amends the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 to promote the reduction of air pollution and the quality of outdoor and indoor air. It enables the Government of Canada to regulate air pollutants and greenhouse gases, including establishing emission-trading programs, and expands its authority to collect information about substances that contribute or are capable of contributing to air pollution. Part 1 also enacts requirements that the Ministers of the Environment and Health establish air quality objectives and publicly report on the attainment of those objectives and on the effectiveness of the measures taken to achieve them.
Part 2 of this enactment amends the Energy Efficiency Act to
(a) clarify that classes of energy-using products may be established based on their common energy-consuming characteristics, the intended use of the products or the conditions under which the products are normally used;
(b) require that all interprovincial shipments of energy-using products meet the requirements of that Act;
(c) require dealers to provide prescribed information respecting the shipment or importation of energy-using products to the Minister responsible for that Act;
(d) provide for the authority to prescribe as energy-using products manufactured products, or classes of manufactured products, that affect or control energy consumption; and
(e) broaden the scope of the labelling provisions.
Part 3 of this enactment amends the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act to clarify its regulation-making powers with respect to the establishment of standards for the fuel consumption of new motor vehicles sold in Canada and to modernize certain aspects of that Act.

The House resumed consideration of the motion.

Canada's Clean Air Act

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

When the debate was interrupted, the hon. member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley had three minutes left in the time left for questions and comments consequent on his remarks. I therefore call for questions and comments. The hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley for his comments. I also want to thank him for working so closely with the leader of the NDP to come up with the solution to the logjam that we found in this Parliament on issues related to the environment.

We all know the importance of Bill C-30. This was the attempt by the government to get these important issues on the agenda of this Parliament, but we also know that this bill was going nowhere, that it was ill-fated, and that the opposition parties could not support the legislation, but we could not miss that opportunity in the House.

The House needs to take some action on the environment and meeting our Kyoto obligations. I am glad that the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley and the leader of the NDP put their heads together to come up with this process where, before second reading, the legislation can be referred to a committee, and there all parties in the House can bring their ideas to the table. We can then build a piece of legislation that truly reflects the urgency of this issue.

We cannot afford to see this matter delayed and the House has to take action. I am very pleased and proud of the action that was taken here in this corner of the House to ensure that in a non-partisan way, this agenda can go forward.

I wonder if the member might just comment further on that process whereby all the ideas that pertain to this important legislation can now be debated because of the referral to committee before second reading.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the luxury of time is one thing that we simply do not have anymore after so many years of failed plans, misspent money, and pollution continuing to rise year after year. The competitiveness of the Canadian economy was also suffering as a result because energy was not being used in the most efficient means, certainly not in respect to our competitors. Lo and behold, even the United States under George Bush was able to make more reductions when it came to greenhouse gas emissions than Canada was able to make as an actual signatory to Kyoto.

One might despair looking at the Bloc and the Liberal Party that presented very little in the way of moving this logjam forward. One might despair as upward of 80% of the funding for what few programs were running under the previous regime were cut by the Conservative government. Canadians could be forgiven for thinking that all was lost for this particular Parliament. We moved to find the space within the debate that allowed the most progressive ideas to come forward.

Right now major environmental groups operating in all of the provinces are coming forward with their best ideas. They have come to an agreement on what types of principles need to be imbedded in this bill to change its bad structure, the structure of delay, and the structure of allowing cabinet to continue to delay decisions that Canadians are waiting for.

These groups are willing to work with the opposition parties and parliamentarians to make something happen. They are willing to work with us to make what seemed impossible only a few short weeks ago possible. The Canadian government will finally have to act with leadership and responsibility. It will finally have to make the tough decisions. It will finally have to make the decisions that were lauded and claimed by previous regimes but never came to fruition.

As the Environment Commissioner said, the government was often gone before the confetti hit the ground. That is one of her more memorable quotes, but there were many talking about the $6 billion announced but only $1.3 billion actually spent, talking about programs with no monitoring, no efficacy, and no ability to look at whether money was going in the right place or not.

We have stepped into that void, that vacuum, and created something positive. It will now be possible, if the other parties are willing to put partisan interests aside, to make something finally happen for all Canadians and our climate.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, the government is taking steps toward addressing the very real issues of air quality and climate change, issues that are of concern to Canadians in every region of this vast country.

Harmful air emissions continue to affect our environment, our health, as well as our quality of life and economic productivity. Through Canada's clean air act, the Government of Canada is committed to taking action today that will provide the legislative basis for national requirements that will set mandatory targets for emissions that harm Canadians and their environment. The government has a real plan that will not only enable us to set regulations but to monitor the progress of industry and to report to Canadians on the gains that Canada is making on reducing emissions.

One of the leading sources of air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions in Canada is transportation. Efforts in this sector will play a significant role in the Canadian air quality regulatory program.

The movement of people and goods has serious consequences on our environment and contributes to air and water pollution, in particular. This impact on the environment translates into real socio-economic costs and affects the health and quality of life of Canadians.

Some of the worst emissions caused by transportation are carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds, many of which contribute to smog. Transportation produces 81% of all carbon monoxide emissions in this country and 60% of all nitrogen oxide emissions.

The increase of emissions in this sector is largely due to our growing population and economy, but is also a result of higher living standards. Population growth and the movements of Canadians are exacerbating transportation activities, especially on our highways and with respect to air traffic. For example, between 1990 and 2003, the movements of Canadians by motor transport increased by 24% and the number of Canadians who own a vehicle increased 8% faster than the population.

Similarly, increased trade and habits related to freight transportation activities, including the constant dominance of just-in-time delivery models, result in strong increases of activity. Globally, we expect the movement of goods to increase by 60% between 1990 and 2020, with the greatest increase expected to be in the air transport and trucking industries.

From 1995 to 2003, freight moved by trucking, in terms of tonne-kilometres, increased by 63%. Total greenhouse gas emissions for the transportation sector increased by 25%, between 1990 and 2003. These emissions now account for about 26% of total greenhouse gas emissions in Canada. So, this is the biggest source of emissions. About two thirds of greenhouse gases related to transports are emitted in urban centres.

This government is firmly committed to taking concrete means and measures to improve the health of its citizens and of their environment. This means we must immediately take concrete action.

The government is serious about improving our air quality and is deeply committed to achieving concrete results. Our approach is national in scope and will help Canadians both in urban and rural settings in breathing cleaner air and as a result living healthier lives.

The clean air regulatory agenda will enable the federal government to implement measures to reduce both the emissions of air pollutants and greenhouse gases from the transportation sector. The Government of Canada intends to have a consistent approach across all sectors that are major emitters and the government will be using a regulatory approach in all of them. While voluntary agreements provide a certain level of predictability, regulations will provide greater accountability and codify targets.

With respect to the auto sector, emissions from cars and trucks account for 75% of Canada's transportation greenhouse gas emissions. Passenger travel accounts for about half of that. The government intends to regulate the fuel consumption of road motor vehicles after the expiry of the memorandum of understanding between the auto industry and the Government of Canada.

I along with the Minister of Natural Resources will develop regulations that will build on a voluntary commitment the auto industry made collectively in 2005 that calls for a reduction of 5.3 megatonnes of greenhouse gases by 2010 through ongoing improvements in fuel consumption performance. These regulations will be developed and implemented under the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act as amended by the proposed Canada's clean air act to take effect for the 2011 model year.

In 2005 the former government signed a voluntary agreement with the auto industry to reduce greenhouse gases by 5.3 megatonnes by 2010, a standard approximately equivalent to a 25% decrease in fuel consumption. The voluntary agreement provides for interim greenhouse gas emission reduction goals of 2.4 megatonnes in 2007, 3 megatonnes in 2008 and of course 3.9 megatonnes in 2009.

Government and industry representatives have worked closely to develop this agreement and to ensure that the industry is on track to achieving real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions by target date 2010. The regulatory approach that will apply for the 2011 model year will provide a greater degree of certainty, predictability and accountability.

Our goal is to establish a regulatory regime with targets that promote concrete environmental improvements that are also consistent with the need for industry to remain competitive in the North American economy. The government will continue to work in cooperation and collaboration with the auto sector stakeholders, including industry, provincial authorities and non-governmental organizations, to ensure significant gains in motor vehicle fuel efficiency while also reducing greenhouse gases.

With respect to the rail sector, my colleague, the Minister of the Environment and I support the current voluntary agreement negotiated with the Railway Association of Canada.

As for the shipping industry, the government supports the development of new international standards by the International Maritime Organization, to control emissions produced by ships. The government will ensure that these standards are applied at the national level under this legislation, and it will also support a process under which North American coasts will be designated as zones where ships must reduce their sulphur emissions.

As for the air transport industry, the government supports the development of international standards and the practices recommended through ICAO, the International Civil Aviation Organization, regarding emissions produced by that industry.

In conclusion, the government is fulfilling its commitments of improving air quality and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The transportation sector plays a key role in our strategy.

I know that if we cooperate with the other levels of government, the industry and all Canadians, we will not only improve our environment, but also the health of all Canadians, today and for the generations to come.

Therefore, we invite all the members of this House to pay close attention to the work that will be done by that committee.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, under the Kyoto agreement the former Liberal government had made great progress. It had met with 705 of the large final emitters and the auto sector and set targets. These were manageable targets. In fact, third party assessment clearly stated that Canada would have met its Kyoto commitment by 2015.

When I look at the clean air act proposed by the new Conservative government, I see nothing new. The new legislation gives no powers to the government. In fact, the government is trying to hoodwink Canadians by removing GHGs and air pollutants from the list of toxics. When it does that the government has absolutely no power to regulate.

Also, it has changed the baseline. It is using the baseline of 2003 instead of 1990. I do not think the government should mislead Canadians.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would remind my hon. colleague that the people who are hoodwinking, which I think was her expression, the members of Parliament here are the members of the opposition Liberal Party.

I want to point out that they can take all the credit they want for having signed the memorandum of understanding with the industry, but they did not sign it with the individual manufacturers. That is the big difference. Since they did not sign it with the individual manufacturers, nobody is accountable.

The new Kyoto regime that we are proposing today is that we will make the automobile manufacturers accountable for the targets that are going to be set by the House through this legislation. In that way we will ensure that those targets will be met. There will be none of the fussiness nor the fuzziness. We will do what we have to do.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. Minister of Transport is talking about trucking; that is indeed something within his purview. But he failed to state any objectives or to tell us by how much greenhouse gas emissions will be reduced with the new motors or whatever else he may propose.

He says they will look after transport, they will look trucking. But there is nothing specific in the legislation in terms of objectives or intent. Reference is made to voluntary or optional agreements with the automotive industry. Will these agreements work, knowing that voluntary agreements never worked anywhere else?

I am wondering if that is not just wishful thinking. When we talk about ships, as the minister just did, there are not only sulphur emissions to consider, but also greenhouse gas emissions. But he said nothing about those.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that my colleague will not depart from his prepared speech. Had he listened, he would have realized that the government will be not be using voluntary means, but rather regulatory ones. The member must know the difference between what is voluntary and what is regulatory. Regulatory simply means that you have to meet the target that we have set. If you look at the existing target, that is a realistic, achievable target that will allow things to get done, unlike what the previous government proposed, which was voluntary.

In this respect, I would like to remind my hon. colleague from the Bloc Québécois that if there is a caucus that is trailing behind the sovereignist movement, it is his own. At the last Parti Québécois convention in Quebec City, they supported a framework for legislation respecting clean air and breathable quality air.

In Canada, there are 5,900 deaths directly due to smog and air pollution each year. We want to deal with that, and we will.

When shall the Bloc Québécois show willingness, like its big brother in Quebec City did, to support similar legislation?

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-30, the clean air act, but I wonder why such a bill has been proposed by the government since the previous Liberal government had the most aggressive plan of the G-8. As the former parliamentary secretary to the minister of the environment, I challenge anyone in this House to name one country that had a more aggressive plan than Canada.

In April 2005, the previous government unveiled project green. It is somewhat disingenuous for the Conservatives to suggest that somehow we did nothing for 13 years. It is an absolute farce. Had they read and had they in fact continued on the road with what this government had started, we would be much further ahead today than this hot air plan that we are getting from the government.

The first myth we hear from the Conservatives is that we were going to buy hot air credits from Russia. That is nonsense. All the credits were Kyoto compliant. The second myth is that we do not support this because we are not putting any money into this. Last year we had the greenest budget in Canadian history of $10 billion.

The government is proposing to take action but it has done nothing for the last 10 months. When it unveiled this clean air act, it was recycling some of the things that we had proposed had it not been for the federal election. We do not need to do some of these things because the legislation is already there. I will talk about CEPA in a moment.

In September 2005, the previous Liberal government proposed adding six greenhouse gases, GHGs, to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act of 1999. They included carbon dioxide, methane, fluoro carbons and sulphur, but unfortunately an election came. These GHGs were included in the Kyoto protocol. Our government was committed to ensuring that we reached our targets.

Now some people said that those targets were not possible. They are not possible if we do not do anything. We had an aggressive plan. The former minister of the environment, now the leader of the official opposition, went to Montreal to COP 11. I had the privilege of chairing a session of parliamentarians from around the world at the G-8+5. We were able to get an historic agreement. We were able to get countries onside with regard to the post-Kyoto period.

Regrettably, the official opposition at the time, the Conservative Party, said that it did not believe in Kyoto. It was because some of those members, I believe, belong to the flat earth society. They do not believe the earth is round. If they do not believe in the science then naturally they would assume that this is not a real issue. They should tell that to the natives of the north. They should tell them about the melting of the polar ice cap or the floes that are now happening. My good friend from the Northwest Territories will certainly attest to the fact that we are finding problems in terms of habitat. Polar bears are now being disoriented because of the melting.

It may be good for some of us not to have to walk in the snow in the south but it is a tragedy for those in the north. I have to say that I believe this is the most important issue facing Canadians and in fact people around the world. We need to deal with this.

The government proposes this clean air act and yet that is the party that has always opposed Kyoto and always said that we could not do this and we could not do that. The reality is that we did a lot of very positive things.

We had an agreement in the 14th MOU with the Canadian manufacturers of automobiles. The government claims that this was a voluntary measure. We had 13 MOUs with the auto sector and every one was fulfilled. In fact, in the 14th one, we can measure the trajectory to ensure that the measures to reduce GHGs by 5.3 megatonnes would occur. If this did not happen, we could bring in and use a regulatory back stop, but the reality is that we have not had to. To suggest somehow that there is a problem, when we have already had 13 MOUs that were lived up to, I am not sure what the issue is.

We had 700 final emitters, the largest ones in the country, and we made an agreement with the 700 largest final emitters. Again, we hear from the Conservatives that this side did not do anything. Maybe they should talk to some of their friends in the flat Earth society because maybe the doubters over there just do not get it. They do not get it that the environment is extremely important and that we need to take action. What they have proposed under the clean air act is not action. It has a 2050 target. They now want to add things that they opposed back in September 2005, the things that this party proposed. Now they are saying that they are not bad ideas but that they need to change things because they do not have the proper tools. However, they do have the proper tools.

The amendments they are proposing to CEPA are completely and utterly unnecessary. We already have the vehicle but the members across the way said that it does not work so they opposed it. While they were opposing that vehicle, they have not read and do not understand what we already had in place. We do not need more legislation. We already have the legislation that we had adopted but the Conservatives refuse to use it.

We have a Minister of the Environment, and I do not know if she can spell the word, but she has not articulated a plan that will address the pressing needs. We were the government that dealt with taking 95% of sulphur out of gasoline. We were the government that was well respected on the international stage because of what we had done. As a member of Globe International, G-8+5, which is global parliamentarians for the environment, when I go to international meetings they now ask me what has happened in Canada when we were making such progress, moving forward, had the legislation and had the people on side.

We did not need to go to court as they did in California with the auto sector. We had an agreement on the reduction of 5.3 megatonnes. While the Conservatives were fiddling over there, we were taking action. While they were complaining, I did not see a plan during the federal election on the environment. I guess that is why we did not see anything until recently in the House called the clean air act or, as I like to say, the hot air act.

There is no question that we had programs. The present government is the one that gutted programs that we had brought in. In the one tonne challenge program, everyone had a responsibility to participate and to be involved. What did the Conservatives do? They cut it.

We did environmental audits so people could improve their homes, whether it was insulation for their windows, their doors, new furnaces, et cetera, but suddenly in the middle of the night the program was cancelled. Not only was it cancelled, it was not grandfathered. I, and I am sure others in this House, had constituents phoning and saying that they had just spent the money they thought they would be getting as a rebate and now suddenly they have nothing. We had to investigate this because the government was not clear. It talks about a clean air act but it cannot even come clean in here about the programs it gutted.

The real spokesperson on the environment is the Minister of Natural Resources. I went in October to the ministerial meeting in Monterrey, Mexico where all the environment ministers from the G-8+5 were there except our minister. It was the Minister of Natural Resources Canada who was the lead spokesperson. That is a travesty.

I will say again that everywhere I go around the world people are asking me what has happened. They want to know what happened to the leadership and the vision of the Liberal government in the past that took the lead and was the lead at the COP 11 in Montreal. I say that the best the Conservatives can up with is a hollow clean air act. I must say that it makes me very sad when they will not even try to embrace the positive things that were done and that because they were done by a previous Liberal government they must be bad.

However, according to those around the world, they were excellent and Canadians thought they were excellent.

[Rob Merrifield, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I did not catch all of it but I caught most of what my colleague had to say and most of it was absolute rhetoric.

I look at our clean air act and compare it to him saying that it does not meet the favour of the international community. He suggested that wherever he goes internationally people say how shameful it is that we in Canada are not actually doing what we said we would do when we signed on to Kyoto, which is that we would reduce emissions by 6%. Instead of that, under the Liberal watch emissions increased by 35%. That is the rhetoric.

The reality of the situation is that the Liberals signed on to an agreement that they had no intention of complying with, nor were they actually doing anything about it. Now we have legislation that we hope will become law after it is debated in the House.

We can talk about the rhetoric, one side or the other, all we like but we are talking about a substantive bill that actually deals with this in a way where businesses that do business in Canada will need to comply.

I am wondering what the member has to say with regard to indoor air pollution, which is also in the clean air act. The government opposite had no kind of vision or ideology on that. I wonder if my hon. colleague would stand in his place now and tell Canadians and the House that he at least will support the indoor air standards that would be provided under this legislation and say something a bit more positive about the environment. Everyone in the House and all Canadians are environmentalists. I would like to get my hon. colleague's consensus at least on that.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, far be it for me to be negative. I am only going over what actually occurred. The member should not take my word for it. NGOs unanimously have denounced the clean air act. NGOs have all said that this is hollow legislation. In fact, they say that CEPA is already in place and that the government has the broad powers under CEPA to regulate all air pollution, indoor, outdoor, whatever one likes. However, this legislation does not have any short or medium goals and it needs them.

The answer to the hon. member is that the legislation already exists. This is another diversionary tactic by the government. Instead of dealing with the issue, it has put before the House a piece of legislation that does not address the needs and in fact which NGOs across the country have unanimously said is simply more hot air and rhetoric from a party that has never had, as a centrepiece of its platform, the issue of the environment, which is the number one concern of Canadians.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, I have worked with my hon. colleague for years on energy issues, going back to the 1990s. We need to approach this movement to committee with a degree of optimism.

The past record of the Liberal government is not what is at stake right now. What is at stake is putting together an act that can drive progress in Canada and, with the support of all the parties in Parliament, will represent a consensus that will allow us to move ahead in a way that will take the politics and rhetoric out of it.

Does my hon. colleague not agree that the work we need to do in Parliament is actually very important in building a consensus in Parliament and across the country?

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this party is prepared to work with all parties in amending this bill and making positive improvements. Maybe we could put back a lot of the good things that the previous Liberal government was doing that the Conservative government has decided to gut.

I will give the hon. member my assurance that we are prepared to work with his party and any others that are prepared to seriously deal with the environmental issues of the day.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-30, since I have been involved in the issue of air quality in buildings and the environment for years. Thirty years ago, I started talking about hypersensitivity. I was in fact the first person in Quebec to talk about that. I am therefore pleased to speak to this bill.

We in the Bloc Québécois are asking the Conservative government to honour the Kyoto protocol and its 6% reduction target, within a plan that incorporates our international obligations. The Conservative government must also implement the action plan proposed by the Bloc Québécois to combat climate change. That plan is based on the principles of fairness and polluter-pay, it is based on a geographic approach and it includes a financial contribution to be given to the provinces and the Quebec nation by the federal government.

The federal government has rightly made commitments at the international level, but it must not undo that work by handing the bill to the provinces.

The Conservative government says that it does not want to send taxpayers’ money outside Canada. The Bloc Québécois certainly agrees with that. However, in the case of the oil sands, it seems to us that at present, the government is refusing to impose limits on the greenhouse gases produced by the processing of the tar sands into gasoline, into oil. The profits produced by the oil sands appear to find it easy to emigrate to other countries, particularly the United States. We could keep a bit of that money, and capture and bury the CO₂.

We therefore cannot say that this bill and what the government has in mind are for Canadians only. It seems fairly obvious to us that it is also designed with the big corporations in mind.

We agree with this bill, but it needs to be reworked and improved. We will nonetheless harbour a little hope that once this bill has been studied there will be some degree of quality left and there will be clear standards with regard to the Kyoto protocol. At that point, we will be able to say that we are doing our part to reduce greenhouse gases in Canada.

Certainly, we could look behind us and realize the extent to which nothing has been done, but there is still time to act. Nonetheless, this bill can be considered to be a drop in the ocean. We would not want it to be a smokescreen that will prevent us from joining the Kyoto protocol and adhering to its objectives.

Obviously, we agree with regulating air quality. We even think that this bill does not go far enough in that direction.

This is a fine thing, this Bill C-30, an Act to amend the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, the Energy Efficiency Act and the Motor Vehicle Fuel Consumption Standards Act (Canada’s Air Quality Act). That being said, is this act really going to allow for regulation of the quality of indoor air—as my colleague opposite has said—the air quality that hypersensitive people need? Hypersensitive individuals are increasingly being recognized as people who have a need. I will return to this in a moment.

With regard to indoor air quality, it is absolutely necessary that we approve the LEED rating system and incorporate it into our laws and regulations. We will then benefit from all areas addressed by the LEED rating system: energy efficiency, indoor air quality, exterior environment, lower GHG emissions and sustainable development for buildings overall.

LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and is based on a rating system known as the Green Building Rating System. It was made in Canada—let it be known—by the Canada Green Building Council.

The government cannot say that we are sending our money elsewhere and that we are not doing anything for Canada by adopting the LEED rating system. It is very Canadian.

The clean air bill seeks to regulate motor vehicles. But what about off-road vehicles, locomotives, pleasure craft or transport vessels? In addition, the Minister of Transportation told us that he wants to reduce sulphur emissions of boats, but he did not say that he wants to reduce GHGs. There are also buses, trucks, road trains and tractors. There are hundreds of thousands of them. Then there are cranes, construction equipment, planes, snowmobiles and ATVs.

Why not add lawn mowers, too? A two-stroke lawn mower used for one hour causes more pollution than an automobile travelling from Ottawa to Toronto.

Furthermore, this legislation absolutely must include a verification and improvement program covering existing and future motor vehicles for as long as they are in use. Even though some cars do not pollute at first, they might do so eventually if they are not monitored. This has to be an integral part of the legislation. Another verification program is needed for all the other existing combustion engines, otherwise we are improving one aspect and ignoring the rest.

There needs to be an integrated system for industry. This is very important because this integrated system could also be a standard for the major oil industries. In accordance with our international commitments and air quality standards, greenhouse gases and air pollution have to be reduced at the same time. Such an industrial directive already exists in Europe and it works quite well. This directive, initiated by Great Britain and adopted by all the European countries, is called Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control, or IPPC.

This directive establishes a series of modules including assessment of emissions and local and international impact, and it takes into account global warming, the ozone layer and all waste management provisions. In our society, waste is a major source of pollution.

An integrated system is a must, because the IPPC is a sophisticated tool. It monitors all industrial emissions.

Every industry has a code and a potential for reducing pollutants, whether for global warming or garbage or the ozone layer. Even visual pollution, the risk of accidents and noise are taken into account.

We need to acquire some tools and not reinvent the wheel, which is what this bill does. Clause 46 speaks of reviewing things and holding consultations.

I want to remind hon. members that things have already been done elsewhere and that it would be a good idea to adopt those measures instead of reinventing the wheel and putting off good regulations to 2010.

[Robert Thibault, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his words. He seems to know a lot about this issue, so I will ask him this question.

Is it possible to have a real impact on the environment, on air quality and on greenhouse gases with measures that will apply only in 40 or 50 years' time? Do we not need interim measures so that we can monitor progress and make adjustments?

There were good programs in place. Some people criticized how those programs were run. Would it not have been better to make the necessary changes to those programs and to help industry, Canadians and the provinces achieve the goal that had been set?

The government must invest in wind energy and especially in green energy, instead of simply cancelling programs. It has to put systems and measures in place for when we are no longer here.

We are talking about indoor air quality, without having a definition of what that means and without knowing what programs have been put in place. There could be a register of gastric gases, for all I know. Programs must be put in place, though.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for this excellent question. I agree with him that I will be long gone because, in 2050, I would be 106. I am sure I will be gone by then.

The government is obviously taking the longest way about; that is why I spoke of a smokescreen. I am afraid of having the government throw smoke at us to pollute us and prevent us from seeing what is going on when in fact there is very little going on. We know the issues. We have known them for quite a while and we know what to do. It is true that there were good programs in place. They felt that more changes were required, but we could have made these changes. For instance, EnerGuide was such a good program that Quebec continued it. The reduction in tonnes of CO₂ achieved through that program was also excellent.

All the motor vehicle programs already exist. They are found in California, they are excellent, and we know exactly what standards we could put in place. Given that these standards apply to vehicles in the U.S. anyway, we could ask the companies to take the same time limits used in California and apply them to vehicles sold in Canada. I am also convinced that such standards would work very well and very quickly.

[Rob Merrifield, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I believe my colleague said something about the rail line industry not being regulated. We are here today to debate this piece of legislation so it is clear in everybody's mind as we move forward to vote on it and get it into committee.

Just for clarification, by 2010 the rail sector will be regulated. I wonder if my colleague understood that when he commented that the rail lines were not to be regulated.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, if my hon. colleague is referring to Bill C-11, which will indeed take effect in 2011, I will point out to him that there is nothing about hybrid locomotives in that bill. There is no stated requirement for all train engines in rail yards to be hybrids by 2011, and there is nothing about the type of oil to use in order to reduce sulphur and particulate emissions either. None of that is covered.

What is this legislation, which I am very familiar with and have discussed previously, all about? What more does it do?

Perhaps we should put that in Bill C-30, because we did not in Bill C-11.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to speak to the motion to send the clean air act to a legislative committee so all parties of the House can participate in the development of a significant thing for Canada, for the economy of Canada and for the future of our children and grandchildren.

Action on climate change must happen now so our families have cleaner air to breathe and cleaner water to use. The average Canadian wants results from us.

When we look at greenhouse gas emissions, we know quite well that they are mostly created through the burning of fossil fuels. The fossil fuel industry is large. The energy industry has taken on a great proportion.

At the same time, over the past 20 years, since the failed national energy program, we have been unable to discuss in a rational fashion a national energy strategy, a way to look at the energy picture of our country. The situation is further exacerbated by the provincial control over resources. It is not laid out very carefully so we can take charge of our future in energy and our environment.

We need to look at alternatives to fossil fuels, not only because they create greenhouse gases but because Canada, as well as the rest of the world, is running out of fossil fuels that are affordable to any economy.

There is much discussion about whether the world has reached peak oil production. The U.S. already has and it has moved to a point where it spends an incredible amount of money on defence and foreign relations simply to hold on to its supply of oil.

Canada has reached peak production in conventional oil. We still have to rely on heavy oil from the tar sands to maintain and increase any production in our system. That is the reality of Canada in oil. Are we an energy super power? Not really.

According to Natural Resources Canada, we will reach peak production of natural gas in 2011, at 6.6 trillion cubic feet. This is a serious issue for all Canadians. Canadian use natural gas in their homes and businesses. This issue really speaks to what we are doing here as well.

Today the energy required to support the conventional production of natural gas and crude oil represents between 8% and 15% of the net energy produced. For unconventional production, we are moving with ever increasing speed, whether it is the tar sands, coal bed methane or very difficult to reach sources of energy. The energy required represents more than 30% of the energy required to extract it.

When we talk about intensity of emissions in the energy industry, we really miss the boat. We do not have a proposition that says we will reduce the intensity of emissions. We will increase it because that is the way the energy industry is moving.

We are going to see the demand for natural gas increasing. We know that probably by 2015 we will have to abrogate the proportionality clause in the NAFTA agreement. We will be unable to keep up the supply of natural gas to the U.S. to the extent that we do now. We simply will not have that supply available. We will be unable to use it in our own homes.

When we talk about the clean air act and setting short term targets for improving energy efficiency and use of energy and for developing alternative energy, we are working to save our economy and moving it forward in a progressive fashion. This is not only about cleaning the air and meeting our Kyoto commitments, it also about taking care of the basics of Canadian life with a good supply of energy.

A few people believe that importing liquefied natural gas into Canada is going solve many of our energy problems. This could not be further from the truth. It is clear that the projects proposed for Quebec, New Brunswick, British Columbia and Nova Scotia are simply meant to feed gas to the United States.

The U.S. currently accounts for 25% of the natural gas consumed in the world every day. It will increase its use of liquefied natural gas, but it is not a solution.

To produce liquefied natural gas, tonnes of greenhouse gases are released when the gas is liquefied and then converted back to gas. Thirty per cent or more of the natural gas is needed for this process. What we are doing is exporting pollution to other countries when we take on liquefied natural gas. We are not buying credits in another country. We are simply turning our problem over to another country. It still has the same impact on the atmosphere, which we all share.

We realize that fossil fuels will continue for many years as the main fuel for Canada, but that does not mean we should not support the development of alternatives now when they are cheap. For example, on solar power, both the Liberal and Conservative governments have failed to provide the proper support to this industry.

Canada is ranked at the bottom per capita in its commitment to the development of solar energy. Compare this to China, which has tens of thousands of manufacturers. Canada has a great solar resource, better than western Europe per square metre or however it is measured. Yet in Canada we have failed to move forward with this industry. We need incentives to make it happen. The NDP would have government buildings built so that solar energy would be incorporated into the plans. This would support the development of the solar industry and provide incentives to install 100,000 solar thermal building systems over five years.

On wind power, again, the Liberals and Conservatives have failed to provide proper support. Wind power in Canada is a great resource. We have a great opportunity linked to hydroelectric power to put a greater percentage of wind power into our system than almost any other country in the world. We need to develop the programs that will make that happen.

Gary Doer, the Premier of Manitoba, spoke eloquently about this at our convention. He knows that Manitoba is moving forward in this fashion. Great hydroelectric resource and great wind resource when tied together will give us a beautiful system.

We would set and meet a target of 10,000 megawatts of wind generation by 2010, place a priority on building turbines in Canada and negotiate with provinces and territories to adopt fixed price strategies for renewable power, which would provide producers with an incentive to invest. We would provide support for local cooperative and renewable power production using wind and other renewable resources. At the local level is where we can really make progress on renewable energy.

There is hydroelectric power as well and we need to take advantage of that. In the Northwest Territories many communities are examining small scale hydro developments. I have looked at them. We need that incentive. We need the sense to move forward. We can get victory in this. We can do well on hydroelectric power in Canada. We have not gone nearly far enough.

The NDP would support the development of hydro by helping coal dependent provinces replace polluting power with cleaner alternatives through an east-west electricity grid. This is one of the key concepts that has to take place. We need to link the country together so we can support each other. We need to have that infrastructure in place.

We need to negotiate with the provinces and territories to stop fixed price strategies for renewable power. We need to provide the same level of incentives proposed for wind and solar to assist in the development of small hydro. Energy use has a major role in cleaning our air. We must look at these sources of energy right now. I know renewables are number one.

Ordinary Canadians have already had to wait under the Liberal government. We have not had to do anything because there has not been the pressure on this issue. There has not been the all party support in the House of Commons that is required to make these things happen. Today we are working on a proposition that will bring us together in the next few months. All these ideas can come together. We can make progress.

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to speak to the bill because it truly represents an opportunity for me and my constituents, for all Canadians and the rest of the world.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Social Development]

Mr. Speaker, is the hon. member aware that Canada is one of only a half a dozen countries that is setting a long term target for greenhouse gases? Very few countries, and we are one of them, have set long term targets.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, countries around the world have taken different pursuits. Many of the countries in western Europe have moved very well toward meeting their Kyoto targets. It is my understanding that the required long term targets are going to be negotiated over the next session of the Kyoto accord. We are going to see this expand. It is very positive that Canada has agreed to a long term target.

What we really have to do with this legislation right now, and I think we all agree, is set short term targets that can start right away, that deliver results and that move the Canadian economy in a different direction. We need to make these moves now. Setting the required short term targets is the most important thing to do.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure members in the House would congratulate the member on a very comprehensive overview with respect to the clean air act.

The natural resources committee recently went to Fort McMurray. I think the member for Western Arctic shares the pride that we all have in the Canadian technology, which is adding tremendous value to economic initiatives in Canada. However, the member has pointed out that prices will be paid for this, prices with respect to the tremendous acceleration in the use of natural gas and the tremendous use of water and the implications of that on surface and subsurface water. There are also implications with respect to the production of CO₂.

It appears to me that a shortcoming with the clean air act is this. It is not a template for action that would marry together the tremendous technology capacity that Canadians have with the technology to deal with some of those very issues raised by the member. With respect to the actions that will be taken by the special committee, is my colleague suggesting a template for action that will have high value-added technology commercialized and used in production, for example, in the oil sands?

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, the tar sands are an important part of Canada's economic future. At the same time, the issues in the tar sands with respect to the use of energy have not been addressed. We have not seen movement on the development of technologies for CO₂ sequestration. We have yet to see the proper implementation of water management plants.

Living in the area and travelling through the tar sands for the past 20 years, I have seen the air pollution that comes from them. I cannot imagine the kind of situation we will have in northern Alberta and the southern Northwest Territories, if these are five times their size, with that kind of pollution going on. We need to set targets right now for the tar sands as well. If those targets cannot be met with their existing expansion, then we need a moratorium on them to ensure that the technology going into there, the developments taking place there are not going to add to the problem that we have with the tar sands.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Brome—Missisquoi.

If he takes 25 seconds to put his question, there will be 25 seconds left to reply.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will take 25 seconds.

I wonder if my colleague could elaborate on what he means when he talks about a country-wide power system. We think this is an excellent solution, but should electricity not also be regionalized, so as to improve self-sufficiency in the context of sustainable development?

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, it is very difficult to describe the electrical grid in Canada in such short time.

The provincial premiers recognize the need for this infrastructure development. The actual form of this should be taken in the energy strategy that comes forward from the government. We are waiting for that strategy through Natural Resources Canada. The government should be talking about those issues and putting those deals together.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Order, please. It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the question to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment is as follows: the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay, Canadian Heritage.

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board]

Mr. Speaker, our government has introduced Canada's clean air act to strengthen the Government of Canada's ability to take coordinated action to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gases.

This clean air act is an essential tool in this government's commitment to achieving concrete results on both air quality and climate change. This legislation will give us the means to put in place new enforceable regulatory requirements to reduce air emissions.

An important element of our approach to climate change is to require the use, by regulation, of renewable fuels in Canadian transportation fuels by 2010. This will be achieved by requiring fuel producers and importers to blend renewable fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel in their petroleum products.

By using these renewable fuels in our cars and trucks, we will be burning less of the traditional gasoline and diesel. That will result in fewer greenhouse gases polluting our atmosphere and damaging our environment. The measures we are working toward will achieve greenhouse gas reductions equivalent to pulling almost one million cars off Canada's roads.

Beyond the environmental benefits, this requirement will help stimulate the growth of the renewable fuels industry in this country. That means economic benefits for farmers and rural communities across Canada. That is why I am very keen to encourage this viable renewable fuels industry here in our own country.

Last July I announced the biofuels opportunities for producers initiative, a federal investment of $10 million to help ensure that farmers in rural communities have opportunities to participate in and benefit from increased Canadian biofuels production. This money is already helping agricultural producers develop sound business proposals as well as undertake feasibility or other studies to support the creation and expansion of the biofuel production capacity in the country.

The biofuels opportunities initiative is the first step to enabling farmer participation in the renewable fuels value chain and increasing the benefits to the rural and farm communities. The initiative has been very well received and the studies resulting from the program will help farmers identify winning opportunities and effectively move up the value chain.

There is no question that increased use of renewable fuels could result in increased demand for feedstock and new markets for farmers. It will help farmers diversify use of agricultural commodities.

Domestic production of renewable fuels provides an opportunity for farmers to move beyond simply producing commodities to focusing on new ways to add value to biomass produced on farms. Local production and ownership of facilities can help diversify farm and rural incomes.

Requiring the use of renewable fuels will send a strong signal that a viable market for ethanol and biodiesel will exist in Canada. This signal is an important element in providing a stable investment climate to entice ethanol and biodiesel producers to invest in Canada, with investment in renewable fuels production facilities and technologies that might otherwise flow to the United States.

The growth of a strong renewable fuels industry will provide Canadian farmers with reliable domestic market opportunities for their products and provide them an important opportunity to stabilize their incomes.

Canada's clean air act is essential to move forward on implementing this commitment to renewable fuels. The act includes amendments to the part of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 that enables the federal government to regulate fuels.

These amendments are being put forward so that this government has the necessary tools to develop an effective and workable national regulation requiring the use of renewable fuels. By doing so, we can maximize the benefits that Canadians enjoy from the use of renewable fuels throughout the country.

By way of a brief background, I note that the proposed amendments will put in place changes to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act that address three main points.

First, because renewable fuels are normally only blended with traditional fuels after they leave the refinery, we are adding the authority to use the CEPA legislation to regulate the blending of such fuels.

Second, there are no provisions currently in CEPA that would allow us to possibly exempt companies that import very small volumes of traditional fuels, even in cases where this might make sense, for example, in remote hunting lodges or in the far north, where blending the fuel would be very difficult.

Third, to effectively monitor and enforce the regulation, we need improved ability to require a company to report on the quantities of fuel it exports.

In specific terms, the amendments necessary to effectively regulate renewable fuels are found in clause 20, which adds a condition for exempting very small imports, in subclauses 21(1) and 21(3), which add authority to make regulations regarding the blending of fuels and the obligation to report on that blending, and in subclause 21(5), which adds authority to require reporting on exports of renewable fuels.

Our government is working to bring forward an integrated strategy to implement our commitment. An integrated approach will not only stimulate the use of renewable fuels in Canada but will also promote domestic production of ethanol and biodiesel and will include measures to help farmers get involved higher up in the value chain in this emerging industry.

As our government moves forward, we will also look at next generation renewable fuel technologies that have the potential to bring even greater economic and environmental benefits to Canada. Technologies that will make ethanol from non-food sources such as agriculture and forestry waste are nearly ready for commercialization already. These technologies have the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions even further and turn waste products, or what are now called waste products, into a valuable commodity.

In closing, with this legislation I believe we are taking the first step toward the new bioeconomy, in which a range of products are made from renewable biomass. Renewable fuels are a cornerstone of an aggressive strategy by this government to expand opportunities for farmers, for rural communities and for the biofuel industry in the years to come.

I look forward to hearing the views of the committee on this legislation, because this legislation, the clean air act, will touch the lives of all Canadians, both rural and urban. I look forward to the questions and comments on this speech.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the comments of the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food.

Of course, we are hearing nice rhetoric about protecting the environment and air quality, but I see a problem. His government has been in office for 10 months and it told us that in the fall it would come up with a national program to protect the environment. However, this bill talks about various phases of consultations, discussions or dickering with the industries, so that the regulations would only take effect in 2010.

Most people are in favour of protecting the environment at the earliest opportunity, and scientists note that it is urgent to take action. Therefore, I am wondering if the government is really aware of this urgency, and if it feels that it is fulfilling the wish of the public, rather than meeting the concerns of the industry—as it seems to be the case right now—which is not yet ready to comply with this legislation.

The public expects the government to take action, not conduct yet more consultations on this most important issue.

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Mr. Speaker, biofuels is actually a very good case in point as to why we have to move forward with regulations such as those proposed in the clean air act.

For example, I guess we could come forward with a regulation to say that we are going to change and demand 10% ethanol tomorrow, but the country does not have capacity to produce that much ethanol. We can say that, and we have been hearing that for many years as previous governments have just said, “Let us just make declarations”.

We have to build the industry. If we just declare that we are going to have 5% or 10% ethanol tomorrow, we will just import it from Brazil. That is what will happen. We will import it from Brazil. Farmers will not benefit. There will be no domestic industry created. There will not be any benefits to the environment here in Canada.

As for building an industry, that is why the first thing we did was to come out with a biofuels opportunities program, which is to help farmers and cooperatives actually get in on the ground floor to plan this. The regulations are in place to make sure that we will hit 5% ethanol targets by 2010. We are at 1% to 1.5% now in the country. This will allow us to build the capacity within the country to create that much ethanol production and biodiesel production.

By doing it that way, we not only do a good thing for the environment, but we build a domestic industry here in Canada that benefits farmers and rural communities.

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

Mr. Speaker, I have a short question for the minister. I am curious. In the notice of intent to regulate, the reference to biofuels is being attached to a specific target. What is expected to be produced by having biofuels other than the law saying that we can mix them?

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Mr. Speaker, of course it is two phases. The clean air act allows us to regulate. By regulating, that means the industry is put on notice that this is not a wish list, that it is not something that we are hoping the industry will do. The industry will be regulated and forced to have that much ethanol in the blended fuel by 2010.

The other measures outside of this bill, including measures from my own department, are to make sure that the capacity is developed here in Canada, for Canadians and by Canadians.

[Dave Batters, Conservative, Palliser, SK]

Mr. Speaker, Canada's new government is showing leadership and vision in undertaking a national renewable fuel strategy and committing to a 5% renewable fuels blend for all gasoline and diesel sold in Canada by the year 2010. As the minister knows, biofuel production represents an important value added opportunity for producers in my constituency of Palliser and in the rural economy throughout Saskatchewan.

I have heard the minister say before that his first priority is for farmers to benefit. That is my main concern as well. Could the minister inform this House today of the steps that have been taken to date by Canada's new government to assist in the development of biofuels production to benefit primary producers? Also, what further action does the government plan to take to create a clean environment through new opportunities for agriculture?

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Very quickly, Mr. Speaker, one of the first things we did was to meet with our provincial counterparts to make sure that the provinces would come onside. We had that federal-provincial meeting.

We started the BOPI program, again, to get farmers in on the ground floor and do their research, their studies and their business planning so that they can benefit from it.

We are going to be rolling out some agriculture-specific programming to make sure that farmers are in on the ground floor of what is going to be a very exciting industry.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to have the opportunity to rise and debate this minority government's proposed clean air act.

Canadians want a healthy, cleaner environment. We all share the responsibility to move toward a more sustainable environment. Corporations, households, governments and individuals all have a role to play in combating global warming.

Canada's economic and environmental futures are entwined. There are challenges as well as opportunities in addressing climate change.

I had been hoping that the Conservative government would present an aggressive plan to combat global climate change. I am sadly disappointed with the clean air act that we see before us today.

The minority Conservative government's clean air act is a step backward for Canada's response to the global climate change crisis. The proposed legislation contains no immediate targets. It does not give the federal government any more power than it already has to fight global warming and air pollution.

Since the arrival of this Conservative minority government, we have seen Canada fall far behind. We have gone from being a leader of international efforts to fight climate change to our current status, that of an international embarrassment.

We have a Minister of the Environment who has no interest in participating in an international response to climate change. We have a minority government that slashes effective energy reduction initiatives. The government proposes legislation that simply does nothing to address climate change.

The findings of the Stern report in the United Kingdom suggests that immediate, coordinated international action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is in the best economic interest of the global society.

The Royal Bank's former chief economist has warned that the world faces a crisis on par with the two world wars and the Great Depression if greenhouse gas emissions are not radically reduced in the next 10 to 15 years. I would point out that if we do the math that is before 2050 as the government's plan would have us look at.

The previous Liberal government had it right on the environment. For Canada to regain credibility in the environmental portfolio, we must start meeting our Kyoto targets and commit to medium and long term emission reductions.

I was proud to be part of the Liberal government when Canada ratified the Kyoto protocol. Canada has a responsibility to live up to its undertakings to the international community on how we as an international player respond to climate change. Our actions on the environment are our legacy for future generations. Good climate change policy will contribute to a better quality of life and better health for Canadians for today and future generations.

Canadians overwhelmingly support actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, they expect all sectors of our economy, governments, industry and consumers, to take an active part in that process.

As well as finding support across the global community, the Kyoto protocol has the support of over 70% of Canadians. These 70% of Canadians get global warming and climate change, but not the Conservative government.

Climate change represents the worst ecological threat that humanity faces. Climate change is a global problem. As a global problem, international responses are the only way to address it effectively.

We can think of many examples of the impact of climate change. Winters are growing milder, summers are getting hotter and more severe, there is water where before there used to be ice, and in our far north the permafrost is thawing and releasing methane gas into the atmosphere, accelerating climate change south.

As weather patterns change, farmers are forced to re-evaluate what they can successfully grow and harvest. Storms, forest fires and infestations are already testing our capacity to respond and recover.

In December 2005 Canada, led by our hon. leader of the official opposition, hosted the historic United Nations Climate Change Conference in Montreal. At that meeting, over 180 countries created the Montreal action plan on climate change.

With Canadian leadership, this conference decided to launch a dialogue on long term cooperative action to address climate change by enhancing the implementation of the Kyoto protocol and of the convention. This was a major victory for the global community.

National governments would now have forums in which to exchange experiences, analyze strategic approaches, and to free our imaginations to find further innovative solutions to this challenge.

Kyoto takes the first step in engaging Canada's efforts to become more efficient and sustainable. Kyoto represents the only international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to reverse climate change. The proposed clean air act ignores our Kyoto commitments.

The defining clause of climate change is human activity. It is how we produce and use energy. Our economies and our societies cannot sustain our current patterns of consumption. Climate change demands action. That action is not found in this proposed clean air act.

Smog and climate change are two separate problems. The Conservative government suggests that this legislation, the clean air act, focuses on clean air. However, Canada's clean air strategy 2000 already exists through an umbrella environmental legislation called the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, CEPA, that was passed in 1999 by the Liberals.

The Conservatives also say that their plan will talk about bringing in new environmental regulations. Under CEPA, there already exists the flexibility to introduce the required regulations.

The proposed clean air act does not take any action to combat climate change caused by greenhouse gases. We cannot cut corners when it comes to the air that we breathe. Canadians are ready, willing and able to work toward a greener world.

In my constituency, and right across the Waterloo region, the EnerGuide program for houses was extremely successful. It was administered by the residential energy efficiency project. The EnerGuide program led to 2,400 tonnes of CO₂ reductions annually, with an estimated $700,000 in energy savings every year for participating homeowners, and a further $3 million to $5 million in local spending on building materials and labour; all of this for $535,000 in federal grants to a program for those who participated in the Waterloo region.

This legislation does nothing to engage Canadians in environmental action and it does nothing to engage Canada in the international efforts to respond to climate change.

This piece of legislation is being referred to a legislative committee before second reading. I can only hope that it takes a transformative change during this committee process because it falls woefully short and is inadequate to what Canadians expect of their government, and what the international community expects of Canada.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member opposite for her speech although I have to disagree very strongly with a number of her points. I have great respect for the member opposite but she either has not read the act completely or she has been misguided by her researchers, or perhaps the member does not have the researchers who are available.

I did pay attention to a number of her comments. I regret that I was not here for the whole thing, but I heard a lot about the Liberals setting up this meeting in Montreal, that they had this forum for dialogue, that they were going to have these forums for exchanges of experiences, and all this kind of talk. What has that given Canadians?

The clean air act, unlike whatever the Liberals think they did in the last 10 years, addresses all industries in all aspects, and it is not voluntary or “please do this by whenever”. It is mandatory and there is action in this plan for those sectors that fail to meet their targets.

I know the member is going to say there are no targets but that is not true either. Just a couple of weeks ago we announced the targets for lawnmowers, motorcycles, ATVs and snowmobiles. It is very detailed and very specific.

CEPA was signed in 1999 and what did it do? It did exactly what the country has come to know that the Liberals are famous for: nothing.

The member knows very well that the number of smog days 10 years ago in Ontario was about 4. The number of smog days last year in Toronto alone was about 48. The Liberals, by their own admission and by the admission of the Auditor General and the world, have indicated quite clearly that what they were doing, which I would suggest is nothing but let us be fair they were doing something, did not meet these so-called targets. They went over by 35%.

So, CEPA in 1999, dialogues and conversations in Montreal, and speaking to folks around the world is not what Canadians need. Does the member dispute the facts that under the tenure of the Liberal government, smog days went up? I see that she has a great answer coming back, but what I want to know is, did the smog days not go up? What Canadians want is action. They want to breathe clean air here, not just spend taxpayers' dollars on hot air credits from undeveloped countries.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for engaging in this discourse and I want to tell him that Kyoto was a first step, and the Montreal meeting that I was talking about which happened a year ago was what came after Kyoto. We do have to have meaningful targets. I know that he is very engaged in what he thinks is this regulatory regime that he proposes this clean air act has, but I would point out to him that all of those abilities currently exist under the CEPA legislation which we brought in, in 1999.

I was parliamentary secretary to the minister of the environment during the era that we ratified Kyoto and it got much discussion. I would like to point out to him that global warming and greenhouse gas emissions do not buy a visa when they cross an international geopolitical boundary and it is absolutely essential that we do this in a concerted effort with all of the countries in the UN.

I would also like to point out to my hon. friend that it was his government that cancelled the $338 million flow of revenue that was going to go to Ontario to help it close down its coal-fired electricity plants. It is his government that is contributing to bad habits instead of looking forward with concrete targets that kick in well before 2050, which is its plan, and empowers Canadians and other levels of government to make sure that good environmental policy is good economical policy. To turn our backs on international obligations such as Kyoto is merely making us an embarrassment to the international community and is very regressive.

Canadians get climate change and they are more than willing to participate.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to this bill, which amends the Canadian Environmental Protection Act to create regulatory powers in relation to air pollutants and greenhouse gases. I will note that these are not new powers, because they exist at present in the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.

To begin, I will say that, like my party, the Bloc Québécois, I support sending this bill to committee before second reading. Given that we are in the very first stages of consideration of this bill, this will give me an opportunity to inform the minister and the members who will be examining amendments to this bill about the health problems that are associated with certain toxic substances.

This bill is a statement of intent, in which the government sets out details of the regulations that it intends to make in the years to come and the timetables it is adopting for that purpose. I am indeed talking about regulations with timetables. This document shows that the government is wiping the slate, starting over at zero, and initiating a series of consultations in three phases which will, we are told, lead to mandatory standards being put in place by 2010 at the earliest.

The minister has not told us whether this “clean slate” means a slate clean of all the regulations we may have made since 2000. Regulations made since 1989 have been laid down and brought forward to protect both the environment and health. We do not know whether those regulations will or will not still be in force in 2010. We have no guarantee.

This bill amends the Energy Efficiency Act, and that is why I am speaking today. At first glance, we would assume that the proposed amendments to the Energy Efficiency Act are an improvement, because they cover substances that are not regulated and they raise the standards for other substances that are already regulated.

It is impossible to know whether this is genuine progress or simply an update to the standards that the Agence de l'efficacité énergétique regularly makes. One of the substances already regulated is tetrachloroethylene (TCE)—or perchloroethylene (PERC)—and I would like to talk about that. I will talk about that in a moment.

The Canadian Environmental Protection Act already provides for the power to limit emissions of toxic substances and to fine those who exceed the limits and even provides for creating a tradeable permit mechanism. Unfortunately, if the past is any indication of the future, there is no guarantee that the new act will truly control greenhouse gases or air pollutants.

I would like to come back to the examples I just cited. Perchloroethylene (PERC), also known as tetrachloroethylene (TCE), is used as a degreasing solvent. This means that it is used in garages, but also, and mainly, in dry cleaning establishments. It is estimated that there are over 700 dry cleaners in Quebec.

PERC is extremely toxic. In 1989, it was one of the 44 substances placed on the Priority Substances List, under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, because it destroys ozone. PERC, or tetrachloroethylene, is even the subject of specific rules enacted by the House of Commons on January 1, 2004.

PERC is toxic to human health and the environment. It is also carcinogenic. It is very volatile. It remains suspended in the environment and causes problems for the liver and the central nervous system. It has been found in the breast milk of women who work in dry cleaning establishments and even in food coming from adjoining restaurants. Studies have been conducted showing, for example, that if there is a dry cleaner in a shopping centre PERC has been found in adjacent businesses.

From January 1996 to March 1997, Environment Canada carried out a demonstration project on a wet cleaning process. However, the department did not invest sufficient funds and as a result the project was abandoned. It must be said that the toxicity of PERC or TCE has been known since 1989. In 2001, Environment Canada conducted studies and carried out interviews with people in the industry, including workers in the sector as well as the companies that produced PERC. Following those steps, the department ordered a reduction in the use of PERC. Alternatives procedures and technologies were supposed to be used because they are available. The companies were supposed to provide annual reports on their use of PERC and TCE in vapour degreasing.

Unfortunately, Environment Canada did not enforce that policy. Instead it came up with a new regulation in 2004, which limited the release of TCE and PERC in all solvent degreasing operations. That decision resulted in additional expense for equipment and operating costs for the big companies and substantial investments for the small businesses. Those small operators were short on resources. They were hard pressed then and they still are now. The new regulations would have required them to use new technology anti-pollution measures. How could they do that when they did not have the money to invest in machines worth more than $100,000?

So, we find ourselves today with a regulation that is not being enforced. It must also be said that the Department of the Environment did not send out the necessary inspectors to verify whether people in the industry, the big companies as well as the small operators, were complying with the regulations.

I would remind you that PERC is the odour that you smell on your clothes when you pick them up at the cleaner and that is the smell of degreasing. That is what is toxic and carcinogenic and that is what you should not smell.

There is an environmentally friendly dry cleaner in my riding. When I pick up my clothes, they do not smell like PERC because they have other ways to dry clean. Currently, businesses and small dry cleaners are not using the right equipment. They dispose of PERC directly into the environment—there is no monitoring. PERC is a greenhouse gas. It is a toxic gas.

My point is that it is very nice to start by putting forward ideas and conducting consultations. We know that the industry has been consulted, as have the people. However, those regulations, which were adopted at great cost, were never implemented. I wonder what the government will really do. They have introduced a nice bill. They will conduct consultations and implement it in 2010. Between now and then, people will be aware that they are working in places full of greenhouse gases. They have known since 1989. They are waiting for the government to act. Will the government wait until 2010 to do something?

The Kyoto protocol covered PERC and TCE. This bill does not. What am I supposed to say to my constituents, Mr. and Mrs. Cloutier? Mr. Cloutier has a degenerative nervous system disease because he worked with PERC all his life.

What am I supposed to say to a dry cleaner from Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines who is just waiting for us to help him? What am I supposed to do about that?

I have serious questions about Bill C-30. I am speaking on behalf of people in my riding who are suffering, who have problems and who are waiting for the government to act faster and guarantee that the law will protect them and their health.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my hon. colleague's talk on the bill. However, I am not one hundred per cent convinced that she has actually read the bill or understands the difference between provincial jurisdictions and municipal jurisdictions, those areas that are covered by industry and the folks who protect those in the industry. The member did allude at some point in her conversation to coal fired plants. The hon. colleague who spoke before she did discussed coal fired plants in Ontario.

I want to point out that the broken promise by the McGuinty government in Ontario is something they have to deal with. Mr. McGuinty promised to close those coal fired plants. It is my suspicion that was a promise to gain votes because clearly that would not be possible, especially in a province that has had brownouts. Where would we buy the energy? We would end up buying it from Michigan's coal fired plants which pollute far worse than ours do.

Does my colleague not feel it is important to move toward clean coal fired technology which has very limited particulate matter? I would like to know if she understands that particulate matter is not covered under the Kyoto accord, not at all. In this clean air act it is covered, including higher technologies for things such as coal fired plants that produce our energy. I would like the hon. member to comment on that.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I do not believe the hon. member understood correctly, because I never mentioned coal fired plants. I simply talked about perchloroethylene or PERC, and tetrachloroethylene, or TCE, which are used in dry cleaning.

I emphasized that it is all well and good to carry out consultations, which we have been doing since 1989, if not before that. The government wants to continue the consultations until 2010, to produce regulations that would not take effect until 2030, 2040 or even 2050. I did not mention coal fired plants. Rather, I discussed the health of people who currently work in the dry cleaning industry or in garages.

PERC is used to clean your car's engine. Not only does this product have a bad odour, but it can also cause cancer. That is what I talked about. Your government dithers and continues to consult, yet consultations have already been carried out and, in the meantime, the health of certain people is at risk. What is being done about this?

The Minister of Health and the Minister of the Environment should be here to hear what we have to say. Personally, I think the bill presented today offers no guarantee that the health of our citizens will be taken into account, considered or protected. I do not believe I am mistaken when I say I did not talk about coal fired plants. Besides, there are no such plants in my riding.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I do not think it is correct for the member to refer to any member's absence in the House.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Point well taken.

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

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member talked about dry cleaning solutions and engine cleaners. All these pollutants will affect the quality of the air we breathe, both indoors and outdoors. If she has read the clean air act, then she is aware that we are the first government in Canada to provide not voluntary measures but regulations to the clean air act that would require clean air both indoors and outdoors and with greenhouse gas emissions.

The members asks for regulations in that way and that is exactly what the clean air act does. It addresses greenhouse gas emissions, the air quality we breathe and the water. If the clean air act, Bill C-30, would provide regulations to deal with what she has asked, why would she not support the clean air act? It does not seem to make sense. On one hand she asks for these regulations to be provided, which the clean air act does, then she says she does not support it.

Also, she is not correct when she says it will not be until 2010. She has heard announced many times, providing she has listened while in the House, that it will be in the spring of 2007, just a few months away, not 2010.

I encourage her to read the act and answer this question. Why would she not support the bill that provides exactly what she has asked for?

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think that the member has misunderstood.

I said that we were at the study stage. This is the first time we have discussed this bill in the House. I wanted to raise the concerns of people in my riding regarding certain pollutants and certain toxic substances. I said that the Bloc Québécois and myself were going to support sending it to committee so that the members who sit on that committee will be able to discuss the real problems.

That does not mean that I support or do not support the bill. I want it to be discussed again. However, we must take into account that regulations have been made and laws adopted already, in the past, and have never been applied. I have read the bill brought before us very carefully. There is never anything said about the laws made in the past or about how they are going to be applied.

Environment Canada has never sent out enough inspectors for it to be possible to determine what the situation is. What is being done with the barrels of PERC? Do we know what is being done with them? Quite often, they go to the dump, and this is pollution. The government may have appointed 10 inspectors, at most, for all of Canada, and the industry that produces PERC is not even being inspected. Is it mentioned in this bill? On the other hand, in the 2004 regulations, it was provided that the companies that produce it and those that use it had to be inspected. Has anyone looked to see that the containers where the PERC is discarded do not have holes? This has never been looked at. Never in the bill that is now before us—

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Resuming debate, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment.

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

Mr. Speaker, it is clear that Canada's environmental performance on air quality has lagged and there is a need for the Government of Canada to take stronger action to protect human health and the environment. The impacts of poor air quality continue to be a concern for Canadians. Smog can worsen existing heart and lung problems and contribute to thousands of premature deaths yearly. Acid rain remains a serious threat to biodiversity, the forests and fresh water ecosystems.

The levels of air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions in Canada are simply not acceptable. Our new government has introduced Canada's clean air act, Bill C-30, to strengthen the Government of Canada's ability to take coordinated action to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gases.

Mandatory regulations will replace the voluntary approaches that have failed in the past. We will ensure the regulations are enforced and their objectives are achieved. We will focus on improving the health of Canadians and their environment. Compliance options are one of four components of our proposed regulatory approach. Emission targets and timelines, monitoring and reporting and equivalency agreements are the others.

Our government is meeting almost every day with industry and the provinces and territories to develop the regulatory framework. By spring 2007, our objective is to have finalized initial discussions on a number of important issues, including short term reduction targets, compliance and reporting options and timelines.

Regulations will set realistic emission targets that will reduce air pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions across the country for the benefit of the health of Canadians and our planet.

To minimize the cost to industry of complying with regulatory requirements, the Government of Canada is considering a number of compliance options. The objective is to provide industry with the flexibility to choose the most cost effective way to meet its emission targets. These include emissions trading, offsets, opt ins and a technology investment fund.

Emissions trading would allow facilities the flexibility to meet their emission reduction target in three ways: by reducing their emissions to the level of their target; by reducing their emissions below their target then sell or bank the surplus emission reductions; or emit more than their target and buy emission reduction credits from the other entities. Emission trading does not replace regulation. It gives facilities more flexibility in how they can meet their regulatory obligations. As a result, emissions trading can reduce the cost of achieving a given target.

In an emission trading system the environmental objective is set by regulators, not by the market. The government is consulting on options surrounding an emissions trading regime. That is why the government is proposing, through sections 27, 29 and 30 of Canada's clean air act, to ensure that we can make regulations that are flexible enough to allow trading and that align our compliance regime to support the implementation of trading systems.

However, any trading system should be self-supporting and not reliant on taxpayer dollars. Our government will not purchase credits or otherwise participate in the emissions trading market.

Offsets are emission reductions that take place outside the regulated sectors or activities. They are usually verifiable projects that result in emission reductions beyond a baseline and are additional to any other regulatory requirement.

To ensure real emission reductions have taken place, Canada's new government will ensure that the requirements for monitoring and reporting emission reductions are rigorous and verifiable.

Opt ins are entities that are not covered by the regulations, but that choose to voluntarily adopt targets. Entities that exceed targets could earn and sell allowances, but would not be penalized for failing to meet the targets. Opt ins could be a vehicle for municipalities and other non-regulated entities to be a part of our clean air regulatory agenda.

Offsets and opt ins will work well within an emissions trading system. Offset emission reductions generate tradeable credits that can be sold by the offset owner to the regulated facilities, which the use of credits can then be used against their regulatory obligations.

Both offsets and opt ins broaden the scope of emissions trading to otherwise non-covered facilities. By broadening the pool of emission reduction sources, compliance cost can be further lowered. More participants also help to develop a more robust emissions trading market.

We are also considering a mechanism to credit early actions taken before targets enter into effect. One key mechanism to be considered is a means to facilitate industry compliance with the regulatory system that will be the establishment of a technology investment fund.

A technology investment fund is a compliance mechanism where a facility can pay a contribution rate per tonne of emissions to achieve compliance. The emission credits from these payments would not be tradeable or bankable. The funds generated would be used to accelerate technological development within the regulated sectors to promote long term emission reductions, particularly in the development and deployment of technologies that have the potential to achieve the greatest emission reductions.

We are committed to consultations, negotiations and collaboration to ensure that the most effective regulatory system is developed and implemented. We have and will continue to involve stakeholders throughout the development process to ensure that regulations achieve real results for Canadians, but do so in a way that minimize the cost to Canadian industry.

We will continue to work with the provinces and territories toward a single harmonized system for mandatory reporting of all emissions and related information. This system will underpin the proposed regulations. It will also respond to industrial concerns that multiple measurement methodologies and multiple reporting regimes would cause an unnecessary and costly administrative burden.

At the end of the day, our regulatory framework will be guided by what is needed to protect the health of Canadians and our environment.

Bill C-30 is a good bill. I encourage all members of the House to support it. When it goes to the legislative committee, I encourage healthy debate.

We have heard from the environment commissioner how important the environment is. To this point we have had obstruction from the Liberals. I hope that ends. I hope we now move past that. The leadership race is over for the Liberals. They have a leader, who is the former environment minister under whom emissions rose 35%. We heard a week ago that a 47% increase was their ultimate plan, then buying down those emission increases by sending billions of dollars out of Canada. The number have heard is $20 billion.

That is not what Canadians want. They want a government that reduces greenhouse gas emissions and cleans up the air that we breathe. Bill C-30does that. It gives Canadians what they want.

I encourage every member in the House to support Bill C-30, and I am open to questions.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment. I would like to remind him that our government, the Government of Canada, has signed the Kyoto protocol. Despite everything that this current government has said about that protocol—that it cannot be achieved easily—and after being in office for 10 months, it comes to us with a bill that postpones any regulation to 2010. That is the main reason why we are reluctant to proceed with a bill like this, which does not reflect the urgent need for action.

In Quebec, on the other hand, we have a government that is in fact federalist, and with which the Conservative government, in theory, wants to cooperate. The Government of Quebec already has a plan for complying with the Kyoto accord. However, it therefore needs federal government funding to be able to implement it. Why, then, is the government stubbornly refusing to provide the budget that is necessary so that Quebec, at least, can comply with the Kyoto accord?

[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.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary talked a lot about regulatory changes and regulatory instruments, but why not put those regulations into absolute legislation? Why not put some teeth in those regulations, in those standards, and do a legislative change and make them the requirements of legislation? Why not put those Kyoto standards into legislation? Why not put fuel efficiency standards into legislation, rather than merely into regulations? Why not give this legislation some teeth and something that Canadians could be proud of?

Canadians want us to take action. Why not take that kind of definitive step rather than the lesser step of regulatory changes?

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have been attending town hall meetings and answering questions. Canadians want this government to take action. The fastest way for us to take action in reducing greenhouse emissions and the pollution levels is through the clean air act, by regulation. That is why we are acting on the clean air act right now.

I encourage the member to support the clean air act. If he truly believes in dealing with it as soon as we can to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and pollution levels, it is through the clean air act by regulation, moving from voluntary to regulatory.

[Roy Cullen, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, what puzzles me in the clear air act is that we are mixing up clean air with CO₂ and greenhouse gases. There is some linkage, but I am sure this is a deliberate attempt by the Conservatives to fuzzy the air, or the water, if I can say that.

What I feel very disappointed about is, for example, when we moved to intensity based reductions, if we look at the oil sands, for example, with the quadrupling of production to 2015, that will still mean there will be an absolute increase, in fact a huge increase, in the production of CO₂ out of the oil sands.

We hear a lot about ethanol. It might be good agricultural policy and it might help with cleaner air, but it certainly does not do anything for CO₂ because it takes a high level of energy to convert the corn or the switchgrass to ethanol.

Does the parliamentary secretary have any insights as to why the Conservative government switched from CO₂ to clean air? The two are not the same thing.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member is quite right, there are two issues: greenhouse gas emissions affecting climate change and pollution affecting the health of Canadians. We are dealing with both.

The previous government just dealt with greenhouse gas emissions through Kyoto. The hon. member said very clearly in this House that his government would never be able to reach those targets. He did not support signing on to Kyoto.

This government is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and pollution levels.

He asked the question about intensity. It depends if it is low intensity or high intensity. The former Liberal government had no plan. It did not know the difference between low intensity and high intensity obviously because the emissions were going up.

We are going to have realistic targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and pollution levels. We will do what the Liberals could not even dream of doing.

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, tonight we have the rare opportunity to do something that really matters for our children. I believe there is no other issue that will have as great an impact on their lives as taking action on climate change, as the motion proposes to do, by sending the bill to an all party committee that would allow every party to bring forward their best ideas for action.

Today I heard a Conservative in a casual conversation say that where he spent the weekend it was 31° below and they did not really much believe in climate change out there. It surprised me. It was obviously said in jest, but it did reflect somewhat the lackadaisical approach the Conservative government has taken in the last nine months, as if climate change was a sidebar issue that required yet more consultation than has occurred since 1989. The Conservatives believe it is something that we should get serious about by 2050 it seems.

I recognize that for the first time the government did propose some regulatory action. That is encouraging. It gives us something to begin working with in committee.

Climate change is an issue that requires immediate action. On the west coast in British Columbia the department head of the Pacific biological station in Nanaimo was saying that global change and unpredictable fish behaviour could prompt the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to shorten openings and further restrict the number of boats on the fishing grounds. Global warming is prompting salmon to appear in areas where they have not been seen in recent history and to disappear from other areas. It is not only the Mackenzie River that is warming; the Fraser River is also warming. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans uses models based on historical information to predict fish returns and to set restrictions, but the global warming trend is throwing them completely out of whack.

The information we are receiving suggests that it is time to show Canadians that Parliament can act in the public interest and to stop the cynicism. Tonight we have the opportunity to roll up our sleeves and get to work on climate change in Canada.

The NDP proposed that Parliament rewrite the clean air act. All parties have an opportunity to put forward good ideas and do that work in a special committee expeditiously, urgently. The NDP took this bill out of the impasse that it was in and it now lies within our power to take action, not in a business as usual mode, but urgently, as if our children's lives depended on it.

The NDP has tabled a number of amendments. We are certainly open to other parties' amendments as well. Our amendments would certainly force decisive action, not only on air pollution, which millions of Canadians want to see, but on a clear reduction of greenhouse gas.

Our amendments propose a series of changes to ensure that Canada meets its Kyoto protocol commitments in the short term, plus a workable plan to meet internationally recognized medium and long term goals. Our amendments include legislated targets and timelines for greenhouse gas reductions. They represent a chance to transform an inadequate piece of legislation into a real action plan which ordinary Canadians want to see.

We have laid out clear science based targets and mandates for immediate action. These would obligate governments to set targets to reduce greenhouse gases within one year. They would obligate government to set out interim targets at five year intervals so that we could see if we were on target. It would legislate a 25% absolute reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 below 1990 levels and would legislate 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 below 1990 levels.

The time has come to take decisive action, even at the risk of offending the industry insiders that both the Conservatives and the Liberals in the past have tried to protect. It is important to continue to develop our oil and gas, but in a responsible way.

In looking through Oilsands Review, there are hundreds of projects that are being developed at breakneck speed. Hundreds of projects have been approved. Regulatory applications are being finalized. Work is being done on final cost estimates. They are happening in the Cold Lake region, Athabasca region, Lloydminster region, Peace River region and involve Imperial Oil, Husky Energy, Oilsands Quest. There is a race to develop the oil sands. If energy security is to be achieved for all of us, we must plan in the context of long term demand of these scarce fossil fuel resources.

We must ask for more measured development of oil and gas. There must be aggressive promotion of conservation and renewable energy. There is a project involving a number of entrepreneurs in Victoria who were propose to develop new, large buildings and to equip them with geothermals, but there are few opportunities to get this kind of project off the ground. It would be so simple and it would reduce by orders of magnitude the amount of greenhouse gas the buildings would use over their lifetime. Yet there are no programs that exist either provincially or federally to support this kind of innovation. The same thing applies to solar or wind. We must begin by ending the subsidies to oil and gas.

The NDP has proposed a five point green agenda for Canada. It focuses on greener homes by cutting emissions and cutting home energy bills. It focuses on greener communities in the way I suggested by giving municipalities the tools to support innovative projects and expand local renewable energies and retrofit infrastructure for greater efficiency. It focuses on greener transportation by cutting dirty emissions through mandatory fuel efficiency standards, not just by adding a percentage of biodiesel, but mandatory fuel efficiency standards, a green car strategy, and an investment in sustainable public transportation, which Canada is still not doing. It is amazing.

In my riding of Victoria, the ridership on public transportation has increased enormously in the past few years, but with little funding to match that with the capacity. Numbers of buses continue to pass by customers; there are not enough buses. An innovative program at the federal level would be able to offer this kind of funding.

Finally, for a greener Canada, the federal government could take a leadership role in retrofitting federal buildings. It could ensure that when federal public properties are sold, that they are sold with a triple bottom line criteria to ensure that these properties and buildings are redeveloped in a way that is sustainable.

I will end by saying that there has been enough consultation with industry and with the public. The Canadian public is way ahead of us on this subject. Canadians are ready for us to act. If we are not to disappoint them or to create more cynicism, I would ask my colleagues from all sides of the House to take this opportunity very seriously and take action.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the hon. member's speech. I have one simple question for the member. We hear a lot in the House about how this act does nothing. Frankly I think it is partially on purpose and partially from people who do not know, but I believe that this is what the member said. I would like to give the member an opportunity to clarify her statement that this act does nothing until 2050. I am appalled by that statement. It is completely inaccurate. I would like the opportunity to retract that to be offered to the member.

Obviously, let us look at meeting these targets, whether it is by 2010 or 2020. From here if we look at the chart, we can see that greenhouse gases have been going up under Liberal governments and they were not going to go down.

Under our government's bill, the chart goes down from today to 2015. We are acting today. Greenhouse gases will begin to be reduced. Everyone in the House knows that and I think the member deserves the right and the opportunity to stand up and apologize for misleading the House in that way.

The second issue I want to comment on is the 25% reduction of greenhouse gases based on the 1990 levels by the year 2020. It is wonderful for those members to promise anything when they do not ever have an opportunity to produce.

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, 2050 is identified by the government as the first date by which there will be absolute reductions. Unless I misread this bill, that is the date by which absolute reductions are committed. I am wondering if the Conservative government had promised absolute tax cuts to oil and gas or other large corporations by 2050, absolute tax cuts, how seriously this would have been taken.

What we are proposing is that we need short term and medium term mandatory targets that determine whether we are going in the right direction, because by 2050 I do not know where the member will be, but I know where I will be, and I do not think many of us will be in a position to say, “Oops, we should have done this”. It is important to establish for ourselves short term goals to ensure that we are on the right track. This is what I was trying to say.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague for Victoria on her excellent presentation, especially because she began her remarks by explaining that this bill shows us how our children will live. That is a very key point and I congratulate her for that.

I would like to say to her that we, the members of the Bloc Québécois, agree completely with the idea of improving Canada’s Clean Air Act. However, just like her, we would like to see some really significant objectives relating to the reduction of greenhouse gases. She asked other members to support the five point agenda that they have proposed.

However, in my opinion, a weakness in those five points was that the member talked about greener homes and not about greener buildings. I believe that we have reached a point where we have to consider all buildings, whether schools, offices, workplaces, garages and so forth, and not just houses as was the case a number of years ago.

Can my colleague tell us whether she considered all buildings?

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. Indeed, what seems to me to be very important at this stage is that we should no longer be talking about slowing down greenhouse gas emissions. We should be talking about reductions and real reductions.

My colleague is perfectly correct in referring to greener homes. I also spoke of the need to develop greener communities and buildings. The technology certainly exists here in Canada. For example, the Canada Green Building Council has been established. It has put forward a number of suggestions for building and development that respect the principles of different forms of energy; solar energy, for example. I believe that I also mentioned geothermy, an energy source that originates in the depths of the earth and that would make it possible to greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions while also reducing costs.

My colleague is perfectly correct. If I did not mention it directly enough, it was certainly due to lack of time, because I believe that both are completely possible and desirable as well.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to rise today to discuss Bill C-30. When this bill was first introduced, it was roundly condemned by all the environmental groups and all the parties in the House. That is why it has gone back to the drawing board after first reading. Even the Prime Minister has sent it there, basically so that a new bill can be built.

We Liberals will be supporting this effort to try to bring back some of the many advances that were made in this area by our previous government and to bring back some protection for Canadians.

I am not going to go through all the problems. They were very eloquently listed by the critic for the Liberals and I am sure others did so in their speeches today. There are problems with the lists in the new bill, the double lists that we do not need, and with the lack of equivalency in the new bill and the lack of reference in the bill to Kyoto. In the notice of intent to regulate, the fact is that there are no targets.

As the health minister said this morning, there are millions of people who are in trouble with bronchitis, respiratory diseases and heart disease, but this bill is leaving the problems alone for five years, and it will not be until 2012 that there even are targets. There is the three or four years of duplicate consultation that excellent government employees working in those departments have already done. There is the removing of greenhouse gases and pollutants from the list of toxins, needlessly calling into question the authority of the federal government to regulate, et cetera.

I am not going to talk about that. I am going to talk about some of the successes of the past, successes that we have to try to get back to in order to limit greenhouse gases in the way they were being cut back in the past. Canada's greenhouse gas intensity is already 13% below 1990 levels. The Liberal government was able to reduce greenhouse gas intensity in 9 of the last 10 years. The environment minister mentioned these past programs in the opening speech on this topic, so I am going to follow up in the rest of my speech by giving more details in that area.

I do not think it is any secret, and all scientists agree, that under the Liberal government Canada has cut thousands and thousands of tonnes of greenhouse gases. During those years, as we know, Canada also had, under many parameters, the best economy in the world. This of course paid great dividends to Canadians and allowed us huge increases for students, for the biggest environmental budget in Canadian history and for seniors, health care, equalization and transfer payments, foreign aid increases, research and development increases, and increases in funds for the disabled.

Of course when the economy is so good, it also leads to huge increases in greenhouse gases if there is no action, and of course there were huge developments like the oil sands going on in that period. I am not sure what the exact figure was. It was perhaps 150% or 200% in greenhouse gases being produced by the country, but having this successful and expanding economy also gave us the largest challenge of any nation in the world in trying to reach our Kyoto targets.

That was why we developed a very aggressive plan. Today I am going to break down the plan into a series of plans. In spite of this increase of 150% or 200% or whatever it was in greenhouse gases at the time of the economy going so well, we still kept it down to roughly 135% of the previous amount. So far, the major and very complex programs that took so long to carefully put in place and negotiate are on the verge of reducing greenhouse gases more substantially toward our targets if they are kept in place, but we see that has not been the modus operandi of the present government. I will outline these plans quickly because if I do not I will be not be able to get them all in.

These plans are basically two-pronged. First, we have been dramatically cutting emissions in reducing the use of energy. There are a number of programs for that. Second, there is support for renewable technologies. The new technologies do not emit any or as much of the greenhouse gases.

Much of this was achieved by our new Liberal leader when he was environment minister. He got great credit from environmental groups and across the nation for being able to achieve this and overcoming the difficulty of working with finance ministers, which we know is always difficult to achieve. The member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville was able to achieve the largest environmental budget in the history of Canada. It was hailed by environmental groups in Canada as the greenest budget.

The environmental budget was composed of initiatives that I will break down into about 20 plans. The first one was a $1 billion green fund that would support green projects to reduce greenhouse gases. It was a catalyst for new technologies. We cannot compare that $1 billion to any other programs of that magnitude that have been announced today. Once again, under the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, it was a huge increase.

The second plan was up to $2 billion for partnerships, which would lever up to $4 billion. These numbers are huge in cutting greenhouse gases and reducing pollution. That involved partnerships with other levels of government. This problem is so big it cannot be done by just the federal government. Once again, there is nothing from the new government to match what the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville achieved in this area.

Plan three provided $200 million for quadrupling the wind power incentive Canada. That was enough for a million programs, which is another under the great stewardship of the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville.

Plan four involved $97 million for renewable power production. Some examples are support for small hydro, for biomass and landfill gases. What is happening in this area now? Nothing new.

Plan five was incentives for biomass. In that area there were a number of incentives. As members know, we have supported a number of new ethanol plants. Not only do they cut greenhouse gases but they offer big support for our farmers. This gives them another area in which to sell their products, again under the great stewardship of the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville.

Plan six was the quadrupling of the EnerGuide. Another $225 million were provided to improve the energy efficiency of houses. It allowed Canadians to participate. The government itself cannot deal with this huge challenge. Why would it have been recommended that the program be quadrupled if it was not working? There were 500,000 homes in Canada in the program. Some parliamentarians spoke about not hearing of Canadians cutting greenhouse gases, but 500,000 Canadians, half a million of them, were aware of it. In fact, the government has now cut that program, which is incomprehensible to all members in the House.

The Conservatives are saying that there is too much greenhouse gas emissions or too much pollution and then they cut the programs that are cutting them. That is like saying that we found starving children with not enough food and we will solve the problem by taking some of their food away.

Plan seven under the previous minister of the environment, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, provided $200 million for sustainable energy, science and technology. When research and development are slashed for things such as this in this country, like the last budget did, it will be very critical to the future of our children.

Plan eight was the green municipal fund. It is a great success story, as everyone in the House knows from their own communities. For over a decade the leader of the NDP was very complimentary of this program. The former prime minister, the member for LaSalle—Émard, was a real champion in funding this program for municipalities across the country, as was the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville. Again, thousands of tonnes of greenhouse gases were cut.

What I am most proud of, in the tough times when a number of areas had to be cut to put this country back in order, when there were huge deficits, the Liberal government did not cut the green municipal fund. In fact ,it doubled it.

Plan number nine had funds for brownfields. What has the new government planned to clean up the brownfields and to match the vision of the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville.

Plan 10, made in Canada, was to cut greenhouse gases with clean power generation. This has been inspired through tax cuts. Again, we put the capital cost allowance for clean power generation up from 30% to 50% under the inspired leadership of the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville.

I have seven more plans but I see that I will not have time to finish them so I will just mention what they are. Plan 11 was clean coal, plan 12 was biomass, plan 13 was carbon sequestration initiatives, plan 15 was landfill waste projects, plan 16 was east-west grid, plan 17 was EnerGuide for low income Canadians, plan 18 was for large final emitters supporting 5 megatonne cuts, plan 19 was auto emission reduction, plan 20 was the one tonne challenge, plan 21 was Biocap and plan 22 was solar.

Those are the reasons that we had the greenest plan in history. The environmental budget was the inspired leadership of the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville when he was the environment minister. We are nowhere near that but we will do everything we can to work, hopefully, with all parties in the House on this new act to achieve some reductions in pollution and emissions, which is what all Canadians have demonstrated they really want.

[Luc Harvey, Conservative, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the speech by my colleague and, quite honestly, I thought I was watching a science fiction show. I do not know what he was talking about. He seems to have forgotten that, in the past eight years, his party's efforts have led to a deterioration in the situation and that despite the exceptional leadership and skill of the former Minister of the Environment, things have never been in such bad shape as they are today.

Because the Kyoto targets were not properly evaluated, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville told the industry that it would never have to pay more than $15 per tonne. Thus, if there were a carbon exchange, the maximum penalty that could be imposed on the industry would never be more than $15 per tonne. That means that the Canadian government would have to pay the difference. Given that the European carbon exchange has reached 47 euros per tonne, or about $70, our government would have to pay $55 per tonne for the industry while the industry itself would pay $15.

I have two questions. How much would such a promise by the leader of his party, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, have cost the government? Second, if we think about setting targets but we limit the penalty to only $15, what was the final objective if not to realize that a mistake was made with regard to the evaluation of the Kyoto targets?

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, the final objective is a healthier Canada and a healthier environment, which will also improve the economy. He is talking about the past and I will just repeat what I said in my speech. The intensity is already 13% below 1990 levels and we reduced the intensity in the last 9 of 11 years.

I am not sure of the technical details of his question, but if he is suggesting that the government would need to pay more than industry to cut greenhouse gases and that people in industry could keep their jobs and still be competitive, if that is the cost of improving the environment, then I do not think our government is afraid to invest money. It will invest money if it is a good investment for Canada, if it will reduce greenhouse gases, if it will increase the health of Canadians and therefore reduce health care costs and if it will produce technologies that we can sell around the world and improve our economy.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague from Yukon and I are from the same area and have the same issues surrounding climate change and are very concerned about it.

The member speaks to a lot of programs that could have been but when we look at the record of the carbon sequestration program that he was talking about, the Commissioner for Sustainable Development indicated that it missed its greenhouse gas reduction target. It was supposed to be 3.5 megatonnes and it turned in at 0.08 megatonnes. That suggests that there was some work to do there.

At the same time, at the natural resources committee we are hearing evidence that it will be about $100 a tonne for the sequestration of CO₂ in the tar sands. This is quite a large figure.

We must be careful when we talk about these programs that have been put into place in the past because we really need some regulation and that is not what the government provided there. When we talked about getting the lead out of gasoline, we did it through legislation and it happened immediately. There is no lead in the gasoline.

Does the member not recognize how important it is to put in legislation that will bind us to getting results for the Canadian public?

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, a lot more work needs to be done in all of these areas. We must continue working on our targets. When airplanes were first invented they kept crashing but people continued to work on them. At least we were trying and making progress.

The large final emitters project was mandatory regulations. It would have gone into effect in 2008 and would have reduced 45 megatonnes of greenhouse gases. The Conservatives have cancelled that progress.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am extremely pleased to speak in this debate because I think that anyone who has children, nephews, nieces and loved ones, is worried about global warming. To stay calm, one truly has to live in a cocoon, somewhat the way Howard Hughes cut himself off from the world a number of years ago. To hear the Conservatives I am often under the impression they are completely cut off from the world, that they have stopped watching television and reading newspapers. There is danger in waiting. Experts—scientists in particular—are constantly telling us that.

It is therefore rather sad to hear what we hear and to see Bill C-30, which is obviously a tactic to postpone making decisions that will have to be made inevitably .

I regularly receive letters from young boys and girls in elementary and early secondary school, who write in near panic about the images they see on television and who are well aware that we are playing with their future. I imagine that all the members in this House receive such letters. I always try to reassure these young people by reminding them that we live in a democracy and that in a democracy usually the common good prevails. Unfortunately, this does not seem to have been the case for the past nine months. That said, nine months in the history of Quebec and Canada is relatively short and everything can change if common sense ends up prevailing.

This bill, as I was saying, includes a series of regulatory powers that the government is giving itself, powers for which this type of legislation was unnecessary and that could very well have been included in the regulatory changes to the existing Canadian Environmental Protection Act. This bill also has provisions on energy consumption labelling and the authority to make regulations on fuel consumption standards for new motor vehicles sold in Canada.

To achieve those ends, the government has introduced a bill that clearly must go through the usual series of steps: first reading, second reading, referral to committee and return to the House for adoption at third reading. Then, we will have to wait for the regulations. This bill, which outlines the government's intentions, details a three-stage consultation process. All that will lead, at best, to the coming into force of mandatory standards in 2010 and the achievement of Kyoto protocol targets in 2050. This is particularly disturbing.

What will happen after the next three years? We do not know. As they have done since they came to power in Ottawa, the Conservatives will no doubt find a way to tell us that, unfortunately, it is 2010 and greenhouse gas emissions have increased so much that the targets that had been set are far too strict. Now we have to find ways to reduce these weak requirements again, because we have to demonstrate economic realism. Meanwhile, the problem will grow.

When I hear the Conservatives say that it is the Liberals' fault, because they did nothing even though they talked a good game when it came to the Kyoto protocol, I think they are right, but that is no excuse to put off making the necessary decisions even longer. Neither is it a reason to throw out all the work the previous government had done.

As I said, I am convinced that, in a few years, the government is going to invoke economic realism and tell us that we bit off more than we could chew and we are going to have to take smaller bites. Clearly, then, the bill as it stands is unacceptable. We will support referring the bill to committee, because we have reached that stage. Nevertheless, it is quite clear that the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie and my colleague from Brossard—La Prairie, in a spirit of openness and helpfulness, will try to bring us closer to the Kyoto protocol targets with this bill. They will try to prevent this bill from serving primarily to buy time so that those in power can give their friends in the oil industry more tax breaks or more time before mandatory standards take effect.

As I said, we will agree to second reading so that Bill C-30 can be sent to committee. However, we are extremely concerned about both what is contained in the bill and what is not in the bill, in particular, anything about achieving the Kyoto targets.

Concerning the Kyoto protocol, I remind you once again that this government has only one concrete target, the year 2050. Earlier, my colleague, the member for Brome—Missisquoi was showing a lack of optimism, but that would be understandable if he were 106 years old. He may not be sitting here in this House at that age, but he should at least still be able to enjoy some great years. One never knows with the advances of science.

It is certainly true that when he reaches the age of 106, he will have many more years behind him than in front of him. However, that would also be the case for me. In my opinion, we all have an objective interest in immediately ensuring that Canada not only respects our signature on the Kyoto protocol but that we take measures to reach the objectives of the protocol.

Moreover, the bill makes no mention of the first phase of reductions from 2008 to 2012 set out in the Kyoto protocol, nor of the second phase that was supposed to begin in 2012. Obviously, this was discussed at Nairobi. In addition, Bill C-30 contains a provision that gives the government the discretion to respect or not respect Canada’s international commitments in terms of the environment.

Could the facts be any clearer that they are providing themselves with both belt and suspenders in order to avoid our international obligations?

The government promised us a made in Canada plan, obviously to gain more time. Nine months after the Conservatives took power, we still have nothing. The Canadian and Quebec public are worried, young people are worried, with good reason, and even older people, like my colleague from Brome—Missisquoi and myself, are worried. As I said, it is no excuse to say that the Liberals did not implement the measures that were needed to achieve the objectives and that during that time emissions actually increased significantly, by over 25% if I recall correctly. It is the Conservative government that is in power now, and it is the one that must take responsibility and commit itself not only, as I said, to honouring Canada’s signature at the bottom of the Kyoto protocol, but to putting effective measures into motion quickly.

In this debate, we see that on the government side they are going to think about it. However, they do not seem to be giving any consideration to what has been done in other countries. For example, a number of European countries are on their way to achieving the Kyoto targets and honouring their signatures at the bottom of that international commitment, specifically concerning the use of better technologies.

We must therefore require industry and industrial sectors to use the best technology now available. Obviously, when there is no better technology that can be used to reduce greenhouse gases below a certain level, we could allow industries to purchase greenhouse gas credits at their own expense. That is the approach that has been taken by the European countries, and it has proved itself. I do not see why we would choose to take a different approach in Canada, particularly when we consider how far behind we have fallen.

In my opinion, we have to be very clear about this. There are things we can learn from countries that have achieved or are about to achieve the Kyoto objectives, and I believe that we must take our inspiration from them, and also from the territorial approach. This is something that is extremely important, particularly in Quebec, because our manufacturing sector has made significant efforts in recent decades. Those efforts have to be recognized for what they are and so Quebec has to be allowed to actually establish an emissions permit exchange—a carbon exchange, as I was explaining—for North America as a whole.

I will conclude, because I do not think that the Conservatives spend a lot of time reading the daily La Presse. Galbraith, the American economist who died not long ago, used to say that “Democrats only read Democrats, but Republicans do not read at all”. I am under the impression that it is somewhat the same situation in this House, in that the Conservatives do not read at all.

The report of Nicholas Stern, a former chief economist of the Wold Bank, was released barely two or three weeks ago, at the request of the British Prime Minister, who is an ally of Canada, particularly in its mission in Afghanistan. He is a traditional ally and the leader of a country which, in the past, has been the source of many of our traditions, including our parliamentary traditions.

A study was done and Prime Minister Blair is taking it very seriously. What does that study tell us? It predicts a series of catastrophes if we do not put a stop to global warming, meaning if we do not take measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

In conclusion, I invite Conservative members to take a look at the Stern report and to inform the Prime Ministerthat the reality of global warming and the effects of greenhouse gases has now been scientifically demonstrated, and even recognized in terms of its disastrous effects on the economy. This might lead him to think about taking a different approach.

[Robert Thibault, Liberal, West Nova, NS]

Mr. Speaker, members will remember that, in the House, not too long ago, when we were forming the government and we were debating the Kyoto issue, a Conservative member—their environment critic at the time—had made a speech, a filibuster. I believe this is still in the annals of parliamentary publications. I do not remember whether it was 16 or 17 hours, but it was very long. The thrust of his speech was that global warming did not exist, the Kyoto protocol was useless and there were no greenhouse gases.

Now, the Conservatives admit that this exists theoretically or in principle. Our actions to correct the situation, which are part of our international commitments, are not conclusive. They do not alleviate the problem.

We find that the Conservatives are out of excuses. According to the report of the commissioner of environment and sustainable development, there were failings in the programs that were put in place. Indeed, these programs were huge. Perhaps there were management problems. I do not dispute this with the commissioner. However, we could have improved these programs, given them special attention, made the changes that were needed and ensured that they were managed in such a way as to achieve their goals. It would have been a step in the right direction with international trading.

I will put my question to the member who, in passing, has made a good speech.

Is he convinced that the Conservative government recognizes global warming as a catastrophe that we must face, as one of the great challenges of humankind? Should it not quickly reinstate these programs?

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

First, Mr. Speaker, I would not want to hurt my hon. colleague's feelings, but it is my understanding that the member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord filibustered for much longer, a few years ago, in connection with the clarity act. The new leader of the Liberal Party of Canada having been closely associated with that debate, I wanted to remind him of that fact.

The member is perfectly right, and that is what we are asking of the government. Why scrap everything that has been done so far?

I know that the Liberal government has worked on these issues. Implementation of all the measures was not complete, but nearly complete. The fact of the matter is that a number of energy conservation programs which worked well have recently been abolished.

I think this is a scheme to buy time, to spare the oil industry in particular and perhaps also the Canadian automotive industry at a time when important decisions have to be made.

As to whether I am convinced, well, I am convinced that the people of Canada and Quebec will ultimately make this government see reason, but as long as its interests are as closely linked to the oil sector as they currently are, I seriously doubt that it is really willing to implement all the measures necessary to achieve Kyoto.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague mentioned that we were starting from scratch, which is clearly not the case. Does he understand or appreciate the fact that the clean air act builds on the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, not replaces it? Therefore, we are not starting from scratch. We are taking a set of legislation and making it stronger.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned, the detailed document introducing Bill C-30 announces three consultation phases, which brings us to 2010. I cannot believe that the previous government did not leave in its boxes some notes, some sheets, software with information that would allow the government to proceed much more rapidly.

Conservatives are right when they say that the Liberals dragged their feet, that their speeches were extremely generous, but that concrete action was not forthcoming. Finally, they never really came about. Nevertheless, some work had been done. I know, through discussions I had with industry sectors, that negotiations were ongoing.

We do not want to go back to square one. Let us give ourselves not three years but rather six months to implement a series of standards for achieving the targets of the Kyoto protocol and also—we totally agree—for reducing air pollution, which is another matter.

[Christian Paradis, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in my place today to support Bill C-30, Canada's Clean Air Act

By introducing this bill, the government is laying the groundwork for one of the strictest atmospheric pollution and greenhouse gas emissions regulatory regimes in the world. Previous governments focused on voluntary measures. That approach failed. From now on, all industrial sectors will have to comply with strict regulations that we will enforce.

This evening, I would like to demonstrate to my colleagues how Bill C-30 can help achieve significant energy savings. Canadians are aware of steps to use energy more wisely. They know they can save money by keeping heat in their homes in winter, or cooling them more efficiently in the summer. And there is a growing awareness that saving energy also helps reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.

Many businesses and institutions have saved considerable sums by upgrading or retrofitting their existing buildings to promote energy efficiency. The University of Calgary put energy efficiency upgrades in place in 1999. Since then, it has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by over 1,000 tonnes per year.

Ivanhoe Cambridge is one of Canada’s prominent property developers. Since completing energy efficiency upgrades in 2004, it has saved more than a quarter million dollars per year. The Toronto Dominion Centre in Toronto completed energy efficiency upgrades in 2001. It has saved over $4 million per year. These are big savings, Mr. Speaker. They are dramatic. They catch our attention.

But there are other more subtle ways to save energy and reduce emissions. There are ways to lower our energy use on a very small scale. But when you look at the big picture, these efforts quickly add up. They represent a potentially huge contribution to energy efficiency and cleaner air.

Every second of every minute of every day, Canadians are using very small amounts of energy called standby power on various devices. We use standby power in home entertainment products, such as home theatre systems, stereos, and DVD players. We use standby power in imaging equipment, such as printers, fax machines and photocopiers. We use standby power in computer equipment, including laptops, desktops, and workstations. We use standby power in cordless phones and battery chargers. And most of us are unaware of using that power.

A typical Canadian home has more than 25 devices that constantly use standby power. We use this electricity through standby power when the appliance is switched off or not performing its primary functions. It enables features such as clocks, timers, and remote controls.

Standby power consumption for most devices is small. It ranges from as low as half a watt to as much as 20 watts for some home entertainment products. But the number of devices drawing standby power is large. If you take the typical home, with its 25 devices consuming standby power all day and all night, and multiply by the number of homes on a city block, it is starting to add up.

If you multiply that again by the number of blocks in your community, and the number of communities in Canada, the use of standby power, every second of every day, has become enormous. In Canada, some 5.2 terawatt/hours is used per year by appliances in standby mode.

Now, when you consider the number of countries that have a market for consumer electronics, the problem is very serious indeed. In fact, there has been considerable discussion and action at the international level to reduce the amount of energy that is used on standby power around the world.

In 1999, the International Energy Agency proposed a global one-watt strategy. Appliances using standby power would seek a standard of one watt per hour. This one-watt initiative was endorsed by the G-8 leaders at the summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, in July 2005. Canada is a signatory. At least six governments—Japan, Korea, the United States, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand—have enacted or announced plans to regulate some aspect of standby power use.

It is time for Canada to join their ranks. Canada's clean air agenda sets in motion a series of initiatives that will meet the commitment we made at the Gleneagle summit. We will move to a one-watt target.

We will build on some of our recent successes. Natural Resources Canada administers the Energy Star program in Canada. The international Energy Star symbol helps consumers identify products that are among the most energy efficient in the market. Only manufacturers and retailers whose products meet the Energy Star criteria can label their products with the symbol.

Energy Star standards include standby power. Since 2001, Natural Resources Canada has promoted voluntary efforts by manufacturers and retailers on standby power as part of the Energy Star program. We will continue to promote consumer information through Energy Star.

But with Bill C-30, we will do much more. The revisions to the Energy Efficiency Act included in this bill will enable the government to deal with classes of products that use standby power.

In the coming months the government will meet with stakeholders who have an interest in standby power, and we will encourage the formation of an interest group to deal with the regulatory framework we want to create. We will develop standards for standby power, and test methods. We will use internationally recognized test procedures. We will evaluate the economic impact of the measures we will take. By 2008, we will have established regulations for a minimum allowable standby loss. These regulations will apply to consumer electronics, external power supplies, and digital television adapters. We will establish these standards to the same level as those implemented in California this year. In other words, they will be the best-in-class in North America.

By January 2010, we will have established regulations for a minimum allowable standby loss of one watt for consumer electronics, with an additional one watt allowance for clock display or other specific auxiliary functions. These standards will be equivalent to the current Energy Star levels.

In other words, we are taking the Energy Star standard—which is a tool to help consumers choose the most energy efficient product—and we will apply that standard to all consumer electronics. We will raise the bar on energy efficiency. Today's best practices will very quickly become tomorrow’s minimum requirement.

Every day, Canadian home-owners and Canadian businesses are taking important steps to use energy more wisely. You can see the results in their electricity bills and other energy costs. But every day, without realizing it, we are leaking small amounts of energy through standby power. These amounts may seem minuscule, but they add up. Nearly every household and every business uses standby power.

If we can use standby power more efficiently in every appliance, we can have a big impact overall. If all devices that consume standby power met the one-watt target, we could save about 3.9 terawatt-hours or the equivalent of removing over 480,000 households from the grid. Think of it: that is roughly equivalent to taking a city the size of Ottawa off the grid for home electricity use.

The regulations under the Energy Efficiency Act are the cornerstone of our proposals on energy efficiency. They will be cost-effective and provide lasting benefits, and they will help Canadian business compete in a global marketplace.

Let me close by saying we are focusing on much more than standby power consumption. More than 30 products now have regulatory standards based on the Energy Efficiency Act. Under the new regulatory agenda, there will be new minimum energy performance standards for another 20 products. These new products range from commercial refrigeration to traffic signals, from commercial clothes washers to battery chargers and from lighting products to industrial heaters. We will also increase the stringency of the existing standards for 10 products, ranging from residential furnaces to dishwashers to air conditioners.

Thanks to this legislation, Canada will be a world leader in terms of the number of products that are subject to energy-efficiency standards, and we will regulate 50 products, representing 80% of the energy used in households.

The savings from these standards are enormous and will help lower not only energy costs for Canadians individually, but also energy use on a national scale. And that means cleaner air. I urge hon. members to join me in taking the first steps in achieving this outcome and support a bill that will have such a major impact on energy consumption.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member's overview with respect to the clean air act. The member spent a great deal of time on the EnerGuide equivalencies and particularly in the area of consumer goods and so on. I think that all in the House would agree that this is a good thing.

However, perhaps the member was here when the member for Yukon from our side spoke about our inventory of programs, including the clean coal program, municipal green funds and the technologies and investments with respect to carbon sequestering and so on.

I would like the member to give us an overview of other programs consisting of the government's strategy to seriously reduce greenhouse gases and at the same time clean the air in regard to NOx and SOx. What inventory of programs is in fact going to be the menu that will make a serious behavioural change with respect to climate change, greenhouse gases and clean air?

[Christian Paradis, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.

As I explained in my speech, this government's approach is as follows. First, what is the impact on individual Canadians? Individual actions add up. With all the devices Canadians use, standby power for example, it is a waste of energy.

This is a problem that has to be dealt with now. Instead of setting up incentive programs that do not work or that cost too much for the results they produce, we are proceeding with regulations immediately.

There have been incentives. But those incentives should have produced results that measured up to a minimum standard. The government has taken a different direction and intends to introduce strict, binding regulations that apply to everyone. An incentive approach to this serious issue that concerns all Canadians is no longer enough. The time has come for a mandatory approach.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Order, please. It is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question to dispose of the motion now before the House.

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[An hon. member]

On division.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Accordingly the bill stands referred to a legislative committee.

(Motion agreed to and bill referred to a committee)