Bill C-30 (39th Parliament, 1st Session) Committee on Feb. 8th, 2007

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Head on through regulations.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

So the voluntary approach did not work?

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Carolyn Bennett, a physician, our colleague from St. Paul's, spoke very passionately in the House about how in 1993 there was only one smog day in Toronto, but by 2005 there were some 43 smog days. That's certainly an indictment of successive governments of all parties and their failure to act on pollution and smog, and that's why we want to take real action. The effect on human health is significant. Canadians see that as a priority and so does our government.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Minister, the Clean Air Act will mandate regular reporting to Parliament on the environment. If this had been the law of the land under the Liberals when they were in power, do you think we would have been ranked near the bottom, as we are now?

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

I think that public disclosure of status reports are helpful tools to keep the government's feet to the fire.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

The reporting wasn't done. I believe the Kyoto report that was required was not submitted—

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Yes, in January of 2006, Mr. Dion failed to comply with Kyoto. He had a chance to file on Kyoto and he didn't do it, and he was the minister then.

I'll take responsibility for the actions under our government. We are a bit tardy on reporting, and that's not acceptable to me as the Minister of the Environment. Unfortunately, it's a pattern that persisted in the previous government that we will correct.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

So January of 2006--and January 23, 2006, was the election, so that would have been a bad news report.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Very bad. I can understand why it would have been distinctly unhelpful if it were produced before the committee. Then people would have had the opportunity to render their verdict on the government.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Thank you, Minister, for being here today, and thank you for the action you are taking.

[The Chair, Conservative, Laurie Hawn]

Thank you, Mr. Warawa.

The next round is for five minutes.

Mr. Holland.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for coming today, Minister.

Minister, we've got a lot of work to do. The reality is that the bill that was put in front of us, Bill C-30, is a dud. In fact, Mr. Boyd, whom you referenced quite extensively at the beginning of your presentation, said that what this bill in fact represented was a series of minor amendments to CEPA, not an action plan for climate change, and that the reality is it did little to nothing to actually advance the cause of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and taking action on climate change. So what we have is a CEPA-tweaker, not a climate change plan. Now we've got to really build this thing from the ground up.

I want to start with cuts, and specifically cuts that have been made by your government over the last year: $395 million to EnerGuide for house retrofit programs, $500 million for EnerGuide low-income household programs, $250 million to the partnership fund for climate change projects with provinces and municipalities, $593 million for wind power production initiatives and renewable power initiatives, $584 million for environmental programs at Natural Resources Canada, $120 million for the One Tonne Challenge, $1 billion for the climate fund to reduce greenhouse gases, $2 billion of general climate change program funding generally--for a total of $5.6 billion in cuts.

I know you've repackaged a couple of Liberal initiatives and given them a new name and given them reduced targets and not quite as much money, but I'm really asking two questions. One, do you regret now the actions you took in Budget 2006, and, more specifically, given the fact that you said this $5.6 billion has not in fact been cut--it has gone to some phantom place--can you give us a detailing of where that's gone and exactly how you've reinvested that $5.6 billion?

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

The entire funds in the fiscal framework continue to be there to combat environmental problems and for climate change initiatives. We're happy to provide the information we can to the committee.

This chart says a lot. We look at this chart and say here's how—

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

But it doesn't say anything about my questions, Minister. Do you mind answering my questions, as opposed to pointing to an irrelevant chart?

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

We looked at the plans and talk and promises of the previous government, and whatever it was doing, it wasn't working. If you look at this, it wasn't working; it was going in the wrong direction. Everything that was supposed to go down was going up.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Minister, can you answer the question? That's all I'm asking. It's a very nice PowerPoint presentation, and I'm impressed by the laser; the laser is very impressive—

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

It's not PowerPoint. I call this the “Dion gap”. This is what he talked about. This is what he delivered.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

I'm going to take it, Mr. Chair, that he doesn't want to answer the question. If I have more time—

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

We're not going to continue to follow this plan. We want to go down.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

It's a very pretty laser.

If you don't want to answer that question, I'll have to wait for, hopefully, something you send us on that.

I want to talk a little bit about oil sands, because I have a concern with some statements that have been made. First, the Prime Minister started off with a less ambitious target of three to four times expansion of the oil sands by 2015. Then we had the Minister of Natural Resources say 4 million to 5 million barrels from 1 million barrels within the same timeframe. Then Minister Flaherty, in China, in late January not so long ago, said 4.6 times.

Given the fact that sequestration infrastructure is not going to be online in that kind of timeframe, any expert at all has said that will mean our greenhouse gas emission targets are absolutely blown out of the water. On the one hand, you're coming and telling us you care about greenhouse gas emissions; on the other hand, you have ministers who are talking about multiplying times five--at most, five--the expansion of the oil sands, which would mean not only would we not meet our international commitments, but by 2020 greenhouse gas emissions would not be reduced at all; in fact, they would be higher than what they are today.

In light of that, can you tell me what your targets are if they're not Kyoto for 2012? What are your targets for 2015? What are your targets for 2020? Specifically with regard to oil sands and this massive expansion you're contemplating and very excited about, how does that match with what those targets are?

So start, if you would, with your targets, and then tell us about how this massive expansion can fit in with those targets.

[The Chair, Conservative, Laurie Hawn]

You have less than a minute, Minister.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

With very great respect, Mr. Holland, I think you're the last person who should be speaking about concern about some statements that have been made with respect to the oil sands. I saw the leader of the Liberal Party of Alberta—

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

We were on together, totally agreeing, yesterday. You may have missed it.

[John Baird, Conservative, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

I think that's not exactly...that would not fairly describe—

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Ed Stelmach mischaracterized my comments. But I'm asking you a question.