Bill C-311 (Historical)

Climate Change Accountability Act

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

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

I'll call this meeting to order.

We'll continue with our study of Bill C-311. This is meeting 40.

Joining us today is Dr. Yazid Dissou, who is an associate professor in department of economics here at the University of Ottawa. Coming all the way from the University of Alberta is André Plourde, who is a professor in the department of economics.

I welcome both of you gentlemen.

A point of order.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Our time has expired and that wraps up our questioning.

I want to thank all three witnesses for appearing and helping to formulate our report and study of Bill C-311. Mr. Dennis Tirpak, Dr. Janet Peace, and Mr. Derek Murrow, I do appreciate you taking your time out of your hectic schedules to join us. I want to wish all of you a happy Thanksgiving, which you will be celebrating this week in the United States. As you know, we celebrated ours a month ago, but I hope you enjoy your day off.

With that, we do have a committee motion to discuss that deals with our schedule, which we always deal with in camera. So any people who are in the room who aren't tied to a member of Parliament I ask you to exit the room as quickly as possible so that we may be able to move in camera. With that, we're going to suspend.

[Proceedings continue in camera]

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Regarding the ACES target of 17% below 2005 and the Senate proposal of 20% below 2005, can anybody translate what that would mean in a 1990 baseline for us to compare? The government's 20% below 2006 translates roughly, I think, into a minus 3% in terms of 1990, and Bill C-311 being a minus 25% over 1990.

Does anybody know what the minus 17% and minus 20% over 2005 translate into in a 1990 baseline year?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, of course, to our witnesses, as we continue our discussion of Bill C-311, an NDP private member's bill.

Mr. Tirpak, thank you for your comment that a target without domestic legislation means nothing. Of course, Bill C-311 proposes a target but no specific pathway. It doesn't propose legislation. So I think we can conclude safely that Bill C-311 ultimately means nothing. I'll leave that as my comment on the record. But I do want to get to the question.

Ms. Peace, I think you and Mr. Murrow were talking about the need to have comparable rigour between Canadian and U.S. systems. I presume there are a number of factors that play into driving the rigour of a system. Would the rigour of a target be one of those determining factors in the relative rigour as well? Could you comment on that?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to follow up on Mr. Calkins' point first of all, and remind everyone here and everyone watching on TV that the only reason we are talking at length about Bill C-311, why we've had as many hearings as we have had, is because the government hasn't provided us with anything to talk about on climate change other than this. We're having to address the entire position of Canada's role in climate change negotiations and our plan for the future around a private member's bill because the government has no plan.

So in our dealing with this, we'd love to be debating the specifics of a detailed plan put forward by the government on climate change, but as we've seen time and time again, there is no plan from the government side. So we make do with what we can, unfortunately.

Now, the one thing that we have heard very often from this government is that we're looking at a continental approach--to try to harmonize, that Canada shouldn't be going at it alone. First of all, that does not recognize the fact that Canada is not similar to the United States in an awful lot of ways. Our economies are very different. Our energy uses are very different. Our production of energy is greatly different. There is very much room for a Canadian approach and not just taking a made-in-U.S. plan.

What concerns me, from our testimony here and our excellent witnesses who are giving us a very appealing look at what is happening in the United States, is that the focus in the United States, in both houses, is very much on their own constituencies. The focus in the U.S. is very much on what the U.S. needs to have happen. So for me, the idea that the U.S. will come up with something that is somehow a good fit for Canada is just completely irresponsible as a position. I very much appreciate your positions, where you've recommended that it would be much easier for Canada to create a plan and the U.S. to create a plan, and then look around the elements of rigorousness, coverage, price controls, as a way of bringing those plans together. I thank you for reminding us of that. And I hope the government here has been paying attention to what you've said about the fact that we cannot simply wait for the U.S., and then make sure that whatever happens could then be imported exactly into Canada. That is irresponsible.

I would like to ask a question, however. In the discussion of what we're doing, on actual movement, targets have come back an awful lot--in international discussions, in our local discussions. How important are targets now, in 2009, and how do they weigh against the need to act immediately, irrespective of targets that we set?

I'd like to hear from each of you on that.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

That's quite interesting, because when I had the chance to read Bill C-311, which is the bill we're currently debating, I actually read it twice in the time it took me to drink a coffee. It's about 13 clauses long, I believe.

Parliament is going through the debate about this bill and trying to set Canada's target levels. We've heard from the European Commission. We've heard from various other outside agencies and NGOs, environmental non-governmental organizations, that have brought testimony here criticizing the Government of Canada's current position, which is to be 20% below 2006 levels by the year 2020, with significantly higher targets for 2050, yet all we have is this exercise of setting targets with no real plan. It sounds as though the United States obviously has some intentions there in the legislative process for a plan.

Maybe somebody would like to help me out with this. If we're going to go as a North American unit, and we've established that we are each other's largest trading partners, and we see what's happening in the European Union, does it make any sense to have different levels of targets for Canada and the United States at a time when the European Union--and Mr. Tirpak has just said this--is looking at what the rest of the world is doing when it decides its own target levels? Would it make any sense at all for Canada to have a go-it-alone approach with Bill C-311, when the American administration is shooting for a target similar to what we announced years before President Obama was elected to office?

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Thank you.

All three of the witnesses, Mr. Chair, have given testimony that is actually really disturbing, in the sense that Canada seems to be now so far behind.

Mr. Tirpak, you talked about this bill, and Ms. Peace as well, about this congressional process under way, which is absolutely extensive. It's a bill, as Mr. Murrow put, that is trying to embrace everything, including the design of a cap and trade system, ultimately pricing carbon, and lots of debates.

Ms. Peace, you told us that the agricultural committees, natural resources committee, foreign affairs committee, and other committees in the American Congress are fully engaged in this race.

Can I go back to something you said, though, Mr. Murrow, that is really concerning? You said that if Canada and the United States were going to have a serious integration on an approach to a continental response to climate change, you would put down a couple of conditions. You said, for example, that the caps have to be fixed in absolute terms, similar between countries. You said all gases sectors, fossil fuels, have to be included. There would have to be offset standards for international offsets and credits, something this Conservative government rejects. There has to be a price control mechanism and a similar carbon price.

How is it possible that Canada is going to find its way through the Copenhagen round of negotiations when the United States is so far ahead in terms of the design of a comprehensive response to climate change and we have gone to Copenhagen now with a blank sheet of paper?

We have nothing going on in Canada. None of these elements of this debate are being put forward in the House of Commons. No committees are being engaged, not even this committee, except through Bill C-311 because we extended the debate.

Can I get your reactions, Mr. Tirpak, Mr. Murrow, and Ms. Peace, to the state of the situation in Canada? Mr. Tirpak?

[Dr. Janet Peace, Vice-President, Markets and Business Strategy, Pew Center on Global Climate Change]

Certainly. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee.

I'm Janet Peace. I'm vice-president for markets and business strategy at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. For those of you who are not familiar with the Pew Center, we're a non-profit, non-partisan think-tank, if you will, dedicated to climate policy. Our goal is mandatory climate policy in the U.S. and internationally. We work very closely with industry. We work very closely with policy-makers at the federal, state, and international levels. We're funded by the Pew Charitable Trust. We don't take dues from the companies we work with. We are independent in that way.

Let me congratulate you on Bill C-311. It's a very ambitious bill, and I look forward to the day that Canada has a federal climate policy.

I worked in Calgary on climate change for a number of years. I taught at the University of Calgary. And I believe Canada can do this, and that addressing climate change is in Canadians' best interest, as it is globally.

Addressing climate change is essential. The science demands it, industry expects it, the general public is becoming engaged, and policy-makers in the U.S. and globally are considering their options. As has been mentioned before, the U.S. policy agenda has definitely changed. It's changed at the state level. It's changed at the municipal level. Within the last year, as you know, it's changed at the federal level.

You've also heard that we have a bill that's been passed out of the House of Representatives, but I have to say at this stage it would be an understatement to say the U.S. climate policy's in flux. Policy deliberations are ongoing and they seem to change daily at the federal level in Congress, within the administration and its agencies, at the state level, and even at the municipal level. How all these multiple policies will develop and work together is very much still an unknown. Rumours abound, and policy experts everywhere seem to have different takes on possible outcomes.

With that in mind, I'd like to spend the next few minutes giving you my take and that of the organization I represent, our take on U.S. climate policy and where we think this issue stands in light of the upcoming meeting in Copenhagen.

You've heard that clean energy is a signature issue for President Obama, in speech after speech, in appointment after appointment. And as Mr. Tirpak noted, he even committed $80 billion in clean energy programs in the recent stimulus package. But President Obama can't enact climate legislation in isolation; he has to work with Congress, both the House of Representatives and the Senate, to develop policy that all can support and that he can sign into law.

I'm not going to spend much time on HR2454, because Mr. Tirpak and also Mr. Murrow have spent some time on those things. You know the bill covers 85% of the emissions in the economy and it seeks to reduce emissions 17% below 2005 levels by 2020, and 83% below 2005 levels by 2050.

It's important to note that this bill passed June 26 by a very narrow margin, 219 to 212. Passing of the bill marked the first time that a body of the Congress has passed legislation to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, but it was close: 44 Democrats voted against the bill and only eight Republicans voted in favour.

Now that the House has passed the bill, the Senate needs to act before the bill can be sent to the President. We at the Pew Center do believe it is possible to get an energy and climate bill that includes cap-and-trade enacted in this Congress, but we have to be realistic about the timing. The Senate debate on energy and climate is absolutely, without question, waiting for a health care debate to be finished here in the U.S., and it looks as if the health care debate could extend into the new year. Even if the Senate passes the health care bill, the bill from the House and the Senate has to be reconciled in a conference committee, and that's not likely to happen until early 2010. We've also heard recently that the Senate intends to take up a financial services modernization bill before it takes up the energy and climate bill, and that would delay a climate bill even more.

That doesn't mean that no one is working on climate legislation in the Senate. The energy and public works committee, chaired by Senator Barbara Boxer, recently passed Bill S. 1733 out of its committee. It's commonly called the Kerry-Boxer bill, but notably, it only had Democratic support.

A number of other Senate committees are also actively considering climate legislation. The agriculture committee and the finance committee will have key components to add. Earlier this year the energy and natural resources committee already produced energy legislation that may be complementary to a climate bill. The commerce committee and the foreign affairs committee also have jurisdiction over relevant topics that could be incorporated in the bill.

In addition to this committee work, I think it's very encouraging that Senator Graham from South Carolina, Senator Kerry, and Senator Lieberman have also begun talking about crafting a bill outside of the environment and public works committee process. They believe this will enable a wider bipartisan group of individuals to participate. In this way they're hoping they can ensure there will be the 60 votes necessary to get this bill passed.

Some of you may have seen the op-ed that Kerry and Graham wrote in The New York Times in which they basically outlined what they thought this bill would look like. Again, it's a market-based carbon regime. They believe it needs nuclear provisions; financial incentives for carbon capture and storage; a compromise on offshore oil and gas leasing; a border tax consistent with WTO obligations for countries without environmental standards; and a carbon-price floor and ceiling.

What happens with this framework? We hope that it will incorporate the work of the other committees and that it becomes a bill in the new year. We think that it will get debated early in the new year. But given the constraints of other congressional priorities and budget timing, action is most likely going to be March or April. If it happens much later than this we'll run into the 2010 mid-term election cycle, which will make congressional action on climate change even more challenging. It's important to note that there are some out there who say that a bill can't happen in 2010 because it's an election year, but every major piece of environmental legislation that's passed in the U.S. Congress, except for the Clean Water Act, passed during an election year. It's important to realize that this is possible. It will be challenging, and it has to happen probably within the first quarter if this is going to get through this Congress.

There are two things that are critical for an energy climate bill to emerge from the Congress. First, because we can't expect every Democratic senator to vote for an energy climate bill, the bill can pass only with a solid number of Republican votes. Right now even Republican senators with years of leadership on climate change have been reluctant to return to the leadership role. That's because the mood in our Congress right now is deeply partisan. That has to change. We'd have to see a number of Republican senators work constructively with the Democrats and the administration to develop and pass a bill. That's why having Senators Graham, Kerry, and Lieberman work together is so important.

Second, and we think this may be the most important, the Obama administration has to advance a fairly detailed vision for what must be in the bill. They need to generally become more involved in the legislative process, much as President Bush Senior did during his administration in the process of enacting the Clean Air Act amendments of 1990. The President's vision would have to include solid answers to questions like how will key manufacturing industries not be disadvantaged, and how will low-carbon energy technologies such as CCS, nuclear power, and renewables be advanced in this bill? We can see this happening. There is a window of opportunity, and we are hoping for the first quarter of 2010.

Clearly, what the U.S. Congress does on climate legislation has implications for what happens in the December meeting in Copenhagen. In a perfect world, Congress would pass legislation prior to Copenhagen so that the administration could go into the international conference with a clear and concrete negotiating position. Without a law on the books, the administration will be hard-pressed to commit to binding international targets. But as I mentioned, we don't think there's virtually any chance that legislation will be passed in 2009.

We think it is unlikely that the governments will be able to agree to a fully ratifiable treaty in Copenhagen. Instead, we think that a realistic and positive outcome for Copenhagen is a strong interim agreement setting the stage for a ratifiable treaty in 2010. This interim agreement may well include specific political commitments to action by all major emitting countries, mid-term emission targets or ranges for developed countries, and other types of quantifiable action for the major developing countries. It will also likely include pledges for prompt-start finance for developing countries. We believe that the agreement also must outline the fundamental architecture of a new treaty that once concluded will turn these interim political commitments into legally binding commitments.

Core elements that we think are essential in this interim agreement would be ambitious goals--agreeing to the two degrees Celsius, and a framework for mitigation commitments, clearly defining the nature of the mitigation commitments but recognizing the common but differential responsibilities as a core principle through the UNFCCC. We believe it should have support for developing countries. The interim agreement must broadly establish the mechanisms, the sources, and the levels of support to be provided in a final agreement for adaptation, capacity building, and technology deployment, and we think a sound system of verification is critical. The interim agreement must establish basic terms of measurement, reporting, and verification of countries' mitigation actions, and of support for developing country efforts, as called for in the Bali action plan.

To be clear, the ultimate goal is a ratifiable treaty, but at this stage, a two-step approach seems the most promising way to get there. An interim agreement in December that settles certain legal and design issues would be a huge step forward. Governments could then use 2010 to fill in the details and negotiate specific amendments as part of a ratifiable agreement.

I'm pleased to answer questions, and I'll turn it back over to you. Thank you.

[Dennis Tirpak, Senior Fellow, Associate with the International Institute for Sustainable Development, World Resources Institute]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for inviting me to testify this morning.

I'd like to say from the outset that I strongly support the spirit of the bill. You'll see in my testimony that I have included a paragraph from the statement from the Toronto conference on the changing atmosphere that was held in 1988. Very briefly, that statement says that humanity is conducting an unintended, uncontrolled, pervasive global experiment; that the earth's atmosphere is being changed at an unprecedented rate by pollutants from human activity; and that these changes represent a major threat to international security and are already having harmful consequences all over the world. That conference went on to set a target of a 20% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions below 1988 levels by 2005.

Those were heady days in the climate change business, Mr. Chairman. I was a lot younger. We were all a lot younger then. It was an exciting time. Today we appreciate much more how easy it is to call for an ambitious target and how difficult it is to achieve one.

Now, two decades later, we have much less time. Since 1988, global carbon dioxide emissions have risen by approximately 40% and are likely to rise by another 30% by 2030. The prediction we made using global climate models in the late eighties that the Arctic would warm faster than the rest of the globe has been confirmed. One recent study in Science magazine predicted that the Arctic would be free of ice by 2037, a mere 28 years from now. The early forecast we made in those days about the warming effects on forests have been confirmed, and unfortunately, our estimates of deaths from high-temperature events were tragically exceeded in Europe in 2003.

This, then, is the state of the physical world as it moves rapidly through a century that, in the end, may see the most profound changes since man began walking on this planet.

Mr. Chairman, not only are the physical changes occurring, but the political landscape is changing as well. At the last negotiating session of the UNFCC in Barcelona, the Chinese delegate said very clearly to developed country representatives that they are ahead us, and we need to catch up. In the case of China, it is not just rhetoric. Today China has automobile standards that exceed the recently enacted U.S. standards. They raised gasoline taxes four times this year. They have set a goal of 100 gigawatts of wind by 2020. Their target is to reduce energy intensity by 4% per year. To be quite frank, China wants to be the technology leader of the world, and they're now making PV panels and wind turbines that compete with companies from all over the world. In my opinion, Mr. Chairman, China gets it. They really do.

In my own country, President Obama has also changed the political landscape. His administration has allocated $80 billion of the stimulus financing to energy efficiency and renewable energy projects. Our Department of Energy is accelerating the introduction of new efficiency standards for appliances. The administration has also accelerated the introduction of efficiency standards for cars to 2016 from 2020. The EPA is moving forward to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. Twenty-eight states have renewable performance standards that set mandatory targets for the production of electricity from renewable energy.

On the congressional front, our House of Representatives has passed HR2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act, and the Senate is moving forward to develop a complementary bill. Both bills are aimed at reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions to between 17% and 20% below 2005 levels by 2020 and to 83% below 2005 levels by 2050 under a cap. It would also allow for the use of offsets, and they have included performance standards for sources that are not covered by the cap. I would also say that the bill has set in motion a planning process for adaptation in the U.S., and it provides financing for adaptation and efforts to reduce deforestation in developing countries. But even in the absence of this bill, I think the President is intent on using the existing regulatory authority to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

This, then, is the direction in which two of your major economic competitors are moving and is one of the reasons why I would urge you to consider Bill C-311. While far from comprehensive, I believe it sets in motion a process that would allow Canada to resume its place among countries that are leading the fight against global warming. It would position Canada to become a technology leader and put your economy on a low-carbon pathway.

Let me add just a few comments on the bill itself.

The target of 25% reduction by 2020 from 1990 would be a significant challenge; there is no doubt about that. But if you are to achieve the long-term objective of an 80% reduction by 2050, Canada would need to be ambitious in the first decade, or else it would have to proceed much more quickly in subsequent decades.

If the minister chose to implement the plan through a cap and trade program—and I see that he has flexibility to issue regulations and other means—an important means to control costs would be the use of domestic and international offsets. Adding language to authorize the use of such a measure might be considered.

The bill deals with domestic GHG emissions, but the world expects much more. It expects assistance with regard to adaptation, encouraging technology cooperation, efforts to reduce deforestation. I would urge you to consider or at least not forget the need to address climate change in a comprehensive manner.

Implementation of the provisions also will require financial support. The U.S. ACES bill solves this problem by directing that a portion of the sale of allowances should be used for various activities such as carbon capture and storage. I trust that there is recognition of the financing that needs to accompany such a bill.

Finally, you may wish to authorize the minister to include black carbon in the target plan developed under clause 6. Black carbon is a pollutant that stays in the atmosphere for a relatively short time, but it changes the energy balance of the earth and may play an important role in warming, particularly in the Arctic.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I don't believe the world can delay another decade in its fight against global warming. Canada can't afford to remain coupled to a carbon economy that is rooted in the past. I often hear people say that Canada will not act until the U.S. and others act. Well, I think the U.S. is acting; I think the rest of the world is acting. It's not going to be easy; it's not going to be a smooth transition; it's going to move in fits and starts. We're going to have conservative governments, we're going to have liberal governments, we're going to have Republicans, Democrats. The atmosphere all over the world will change from time to time in different leadership situations; but in fact I think we're going to move in that direction.

So I believe it is time for Canada to rekindle that spirit that was present in Toronto when I was a lot younger and to join the parade of low-carbon nations—not just join, but lead that parade.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

I call this meeting to order.

We will continue our study of Bill C-311. This is meeting number 39. The witnesses we have on today's panel are Dennis Tirpak from the World Resources Institute, senior fellow associate with the International Institute for Sustainable Development. Joining us by video conference from Chicago is Environment Northeast, with Derek K. Murrow, director of policy analysis. From Washington we have Janet Peace, Pew Center on Global Climate Change, vice-president markets and business strategy.

Point of order, Mr. Warawa.

The Environment

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present a petition from a large number of people in my riding of Trinity—Spadina calling on the Government of Canada to support the NDP's Bill C-311, the Climate Change Accountability Act.

It also calls upon the Government of Canada to invoke a moratorium on the further expansion of tar sands development until carbon emissions are capped significantly, environmental and health impacts are addressed and protected areas are set aside.

The petitioners are concerned that the federal government is failing to enforce law that protects water and public health and regulates toxic pollution leakage. My constituents are concerned that over 4,800 square kilometres of wetlands and forests will be lost because of the expansion of the tar sands.

Opposition Motion--Climate Change

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Thunder Bay—Superior North for his great leadership in bringing forward Bill C-311 and for his great contribution to this debate. I know we are supporting this motion brought forward by the Bloc today. I know he makes the point very well that this idea of dividing the economy from the environment is a fatal mistake.

The member spoke about the economic benefits, such as the building of transit cars in Thunder Bay. I just wonder if he could expand more on the importance of the economic opportunity that is contained in meeting climate change targets and how that could actually be beneficial to all of us in our local communities and the planet as a whole.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Madam Speaker, would the hon. member give the House his thoughts on why the Liberal Party would vote to delay Bill C-311 until after Copenhagen?

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hard-working member for Nanaimo—Cowichan.

I am delighted to speak in support of the motion from my hon. colleagues on federal climate change policy. It has become blatantly obvious to Canadians and the international community that the Conservative government has no plan for the future on climate change. It is especially important that this Parliament fill the void in leadership by proposing real solutions.

The motion has three parts, but the first and third parts really flow from the second part. The first part says we should commit to proposing targets that reduce absolute greenhouse gas pollution to 25% lower than 1990 levels, not 2006 ridiculous levels, by 2020. This is, of course, the same 2020 target in my private member's bill, Bill C-311, the climate change accountability act, which has unfortunately been stalled in committee for some time now by the Liberals and the Conservatives.

This target is the logical extension of the temperature limit, which is the second part of the motion. The science has become very clear recently that we must avoid a 2°C increase from pre-industrial levels if we are to escape catastrophic climate effects.

In order to check temperature increases, 99% of scientists tell us that we need to stabilize the concentration of CO₂ in the atmosphere at no more than 400 parts per million. Incidentally, we are already basically at 390 parts per million today.

The third and last part of the motion is about supporting developing countries in their efforts to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and adapt to the damaging effects of climate change. While that is very vague, I can certainly see that supporting others is integral to pulling our own weight to reduce global emissions.

A ton of carbon pollution reduced in a developing country is like a ton reduced here as far the climate is concerned. This could represent the greatest economic opportunity since the second world war to export Canadian technology and business know-how abroad. It would be a sort of environmental Marshall plan.

Other countries have already seen the potential of being leaders rather than laggards versus the bleak economic future of business as usual. In fact, at this point, delay is economically irresponsible. We know that former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern has reported that the cost of inaction would be far higher than action. Unchecked emissions would cost us as much as 20% of global GDP per year, whereas the cost of bold action to reduce emissions could be limited to less than one-tenth of that on average. It does not take an economist to see which option is more affordable.

Here in Canada the recent TD Bank study by Jaccard and Associates shows that even with firm targets, such as the 25% 2020 target in Bill C-311, Canada would still be able to surpass the 2% annual growth led by Alberta.

Canadians have not seen any economic modelling of this type from our federal government. Why not? Not planning economically for something of this colossal magnitude is planning to fail and is grossly negligent. Perhaps the government has done the modelling but is reluctant to release its study. Canadians deserve to see what the government has, if the government has it.

We have just spent billions on corporate tax cuts and on the recent economic downturn, but the government has yet to seriously address the much more costly and damaging climate crisis. It has admitted it has no plan and no targets going into the Copenhagen summit next month. In fact, the Minister of the Environment said just this week that the government will wait to regulate greenhouse gas pollution until the United States takes action and until the global climate action deal is first reached by 192 other countries. We will be the last in. Talk about lack of leadership.

Years ago the government promised a plan would be in place and working by this year. Then it was delayed, but a plan was to at least be published by January 2009, then by the beginning of next year. Now it will not even be until perhaps late 2010 and more likely 2011. The minister admitted that under the American timetable, people will not even see regulations take effect until as late as 2016. No wonder our government has so little credibility on the international stage anymore. No wonder countries walk out when Canadian representatives take the podium on the world stage.

The principal reason the environment minister now gives for avoiding setting targets today is that we should wait until other countries set theirs so ours are not drastically different.

The environment minister's logic has not held back the EU. Yesterday the European Union's new ambassador appeared before the House environmental committee on Bill C-311. He testified that the EU has already set firm, science based targets like a 20% reduction in greenhouse gas pollution over 1990 not 2006 levels by 2020 and are willing to go up to 30% if countries like Canada step up to the plate with an ambitious agreement at Copenhagen.

The high commissioner for the United Kingdom also appeared before that committee yesterday and showed that prosperity and ambitious targets to reduce greenhouse gas pollution was not just possible but that it was already happening in Britain.

The U.K. has already adopted targets like those in the Climate Change Accountability Act, but instead of just 20% over 1990 levels by 2020, it has committed to a 34% reduction in law. It has already achieved today a 21% reduction. More than a million homes are powered by wind alone in Great Britain. Almost a million Britons are employed in the new green economy there. The Brits see that reducing greenhouse gases is not a cost but a huge economic opportunity.

Instead of avoiding responsibility to cut carbon pollution as our Prime Minister has done, Prime Minister Brown said this year that “a vast expansion” of carbon-cutting technologies was in fact crucial to their economic recovery.

It is not surprising that Great Britain should be enthusiastic about reducing its emissions, after all, it is fundamentally about increasing efficiency. It is about using less energy and less resources for more goods and better services that the country produces. That is good for business and necessary for prosperity. The U.K. knows that there is not much of a future left in the Canadian Conservative business as usual process of wasting energy.

So the British government has already adopted this target and is well on its way to meeting it and beating it. In fact, this is the more cautious plan in the U.K. The opposition Tories there are demanding even more ambitious action yet. Conservatives in our country would do well to take their climate cues from their British brethren rather than the Bush era conservatives south of us.

Conservatives in the U.S., as here, have tried to make the environment the enemy of the economy and in doing so condemn them both to decline. They have used this excuse to delay action for decades.

The Conservative government here continues to delay, even to this day. To continue in this way in the face of so much overwhelming evidence, ignoring the demands of both industry and Canadians alike, is irresponsible to the point of being criminal.

We are now skating very close to the edge. We have little margin for error left and little time. The government should know that past that tipping point, over that cliff to climate chaos, lies economic ruin as well. There can be no prosperity on a dying planet.

If we harmonize the two, the environment and the economy, realizing that new economic opportunities and green industries will emerge if we fulfill our environmental obligations as other countries are doing, we will open up the possibility of a richer, more sustainable and fairer world for us all and a more prosperous Canada with new green jobs.

Decisive targets, policies and action on energy policy will create jobs across Canada, including in Thunder Bay where Bombardier can and will build the trains of the future or the giant windmills that we need.

The forestry and mining industries have already met the 2020 targets in Bill C-311 and in this motion.

There is something else that must be reconciled with climate change that the government has virtually ignored. Climate change poses the greatest threat to Canadian security and international security since the cold war.

It is not only Arctic sovereignty we are talking about, although that is significant enough, but spreading pests, drought and desertification, among other things, will result in an acute and permanent global food supply crisis. Canadian crops will suffer too. The geopolitical consequences of this alone are huge, including in North America. Water will be much scarcer for much of the world but overabundant on many coasts where regions and entire countries will be flooded.

For every degree the global temperature rises so do the mass migrations of people, the number of failed and failing states, and wars.

Britain now sees climate change as its number one national security priority. The United States military takes climate change seriously too. Even the youngest schoolchildren seem to know what the government does not, which is that controlling climate change is vital to the health of our planet and civilization. Lack of strong action to defend Canada's long-term economic prosperity and our very security—

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Madam Speaker, members will not be surprised to hear that a lot of the preamble to that question is simply untrue.

I would like to respond, though, by saying that, yes, it is true that we had the privilege of serving as government for over a dozen years. During that time, I was not here but we can take some pride in announcing that we did bring in the Species at Risk Act. We did bring in the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. We did create the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development. We actually did give the powers to regulate greenhouse gases. We did ratify Kyoto after it became law internationally, in 2004. We did bring in the greenest budget in Canadian history, according to Elizabeth May, in 2005. We did have the largest expenditure program in that budget. We had signed deals with every sector of all the final and large emitters polluting and putting greenhouse gases in. The plan was ready to execute, and then along came the Reform-Conservatives. That is the truth.

Now, with respect to Bill C-311, I do reject the member's characterization of this being a delay tactic, this notion that we are delaying something. It was not two weeks ago that his colleague, the critic in the NDP, was in agreement that this extension for 30 days in committee was extremely important in order to hear other expert witnesses. We are hearing them now. We heard yesterday from the ambassador from the EU, the high commissioner from the U.K. This was important insight as to where the world is going and where Canada is situated in a global context.

What we are really seeing is the NDP using, frankly, propaganda tactics to try to score points. At the end of the day, when we examine Bill C-311, it is a call for a plan, but it is not a plan. There is no notion of a plan in it. It omits so much in a credible plan, including international offsets, international credits, a schedule for carbon pricing.

Anyone can call for a plan. I am glad the member has joined us here in calling for a plan from the government. There is no delay tactic here. There is an opportunity for us to hear from some of the best minds in Canada and elsewhere as to how to move forward in a responsible way.