Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
It's a pleasure to speak to this amendment and to move it formally and take a few minutes to explain how this would connect to the previous amendment, which we've just passed, that spoke to the negotiations for the creation of a green investment bank, green investment accounts, and a green investment fund, as amended by the NDP.
This amendment does several things. It amends Bill C-30 by providing that the Governor in Council can create, for example, a greenhouse gas emissions trading system that will require issuing and trading transferable carbon permits here in Canada by large industrial emitters, the same group referred to earlier by my colleague, Mr. Godfrey—roughly 700 large industrial emitters that are responsible for approximately 54% of all of Canada's greenhouse gases.
It also provides, Mr. Chair, for the creation of a domestic offset system, which of course talks about making sure that any transferable carbon credits that are traded are incremental and verifiable annual GHG reductions. They're linked, of course, to the notion of an individual carbon deficit of any single large industrial emitter.
We're also calling for a clear description of what person or classes of persons can actually own a carbon permit or a carbon credit—in other words, who can trade. We would be calling for the Governor in Council to set up the rules and the procedures for trading carbon permits or carbon credits.
Here, in proposed paragraph 94.1(2)(c), we would be doing something very important. We would be making sure that the greenhouse gas emissions trading system and the domestic offset system that we would like to see created in this country would be linked with international greenhouse gas emissions trading systems that establish incremental and verifiable greenhouse gas emissions reductions. These, of course, would have to be compliant with the Kyoto Protocol, as that, of course, would be amended from time to time. It speaks more directly to the two mechanisms inherent in the Kyoto Protocol, the first being joint implementation and the second being the clean development mechanism.
Here I think it's important to pause and remind ourselves of the overtures and the testimony given by the president of the Montreal Exchange and the president of the Toronto Stock Exchange, and in particular the 10-page memo that was sent to the government last December by the president of the Toronto Stock Exchange pleading with the government to not penalize Canadian companies by shutting them out of international carbon markets, thereby driving up the price of carbon for our Canadian large industrial final emitters and of course rendering the Canadian market an illiquid and small market with very high greenhouse gas carbon costs.
This amendment also goes further by prescribing the price for carbon in 2013 at an amount equal to or greater than $30 and of course giving flexibility to the government to take into consideration foreign and international greenhouse gas emissions trading systems. This will be important for us, Mr. Chair, as the European Union carbon markets take hold more formally on January 1, 2008, as the emerging carbon markets out of the United States hook up eventually to international markets, and so on.
This amendment also goes further to address some of the concerns raised on numerous occasions, particularly by government members, the Minister of the Environment, and the Prime Minister in his speech in Montreal just this week, because this amendment, under proposed paragraph 94.1(3)(a) prohibits the use of prescribed hot air credits to reduce the individual carbon deficit of large industrial emitters. So it ought to I think fully address the concern of the government. I cannot see how they could not support this, given that their opposition to international carbon markets has been chiefly, if not solely, predicated on the notion of what they describe as hot air purchases.
It also goes further by ensuring that at least until 2010, not more than 25% of the individual carbon deficit of a large industrial emitter is offset by using credits from foreign and international greenhouse gas emissions trading systems. This is again something we heard from some witnesses, but chiefly to ensure that the lion's share, by far, of investment made to reduce greenhouse gases stays right here at home. In fact, it really does provide the basis for a real made-in-Canada plan to deal with greenhouse gases.
And finally, and very importantly, in proposed subsection 94.1(4), it empowers the Governor in Council to make regulations to limit the quantity of carbon credits it issues, to ensure that the price of carbon is not less than $30 a tonne. This will be important as Canada does eventually continue to trade in the emerging and booming international carbon markets. It will be important for us to give the government flexibility to achieve an appropriate price by using allocation of the number of credits or the total number of credits in circulation in Canada, for example, to ensure that carbon price is never less than $30 a tonne on a CO2 equivalent basis.
So we can see that this is obviously very much connected to the previous amendment that we have just passed, or discussed and debated, and spoken to chiefly by my colleague, Mr. Godfrey. We believe it is the second piece of a new approach to immediately start on January 1, 2008, to achieve our greenhouse gas reduction targets, and we rule out the chief concerns of the government as manifested at this committee now over the last several months.
Those are my remarks.