Environment Committee on Feb. 25th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

I would like to start by welcoming Pierre Marc Johnson.

We have Mr. Morton on the telephone, so he will be hearing us as we begin.

I want to remind members that we did send to each of these gentlemen a list of the kinds of things we wanted to find out. I'll review that very quickly.

We asked them to talk about the roles and responsibilities of the advisers and the nature of the advice they gave to the minister. Were written, formal documents provided to the minister in preparation for the conference? If so, the committee would like to see copies. As intelligent lay people, what did you learn from the process? What surprised you? What impressions did you have of where you thought the whole process was going? Where do you think the process is going? Are you optimistic?

Of course we offer each of our guests a ten-minute presentation and then we'll go to our usual procedure for questions.

I believe everybody received a copy of the expenses, the costs incurred, as requested. I trust everyone received that at their office today. I would ask Pierre Marc to begin with a presentation of up to ten minutes, please.

[Pierre Marc Johnson, Senior Advisor to the Minister of Environment, the Hon. John Baird, for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference (Bali - December 2007), As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I will give my presentation in both French and English, although we have well-qualified interpreters here with us.

I attended the Bali Conference as an adviser. I was accompanied by Elizabeth Dowdeswell, the former assistant deputy minister at Environment Canada and former director of the United Nations Environment Program; by Mary Simon, one of the most prominent figures in Canada's far north; and by Ian Morton, who will be speaking later. We were there as individuals. We were part of the delegation but did not represent Canadian positions. We appreciated the fact that the minister allowed us to speak with him.

Our mandate and the object of our functions was essentially to advise the minister at his will--and it turned out to also be at our will--on various elements going on during the conference. The object of this advice was a lot about the process. As you know, most of these conferences are pretty concentrated on process. Secondly, some of us gave advice to the minister on various delegations that were present or the various bodies that were represented at the meeting. Finally, we commented for the minister on certain events taking place.

On our activities, we were to be available to the minister and present at the various briefings given by officials. We accompanied the minister to various bilateral meetings--not all of us, but some of us some of the time. We talked with some of the delegations. I talked mostly with European delegations because I've known some people on that circuit for a few years now. That was also the case with Elizabeth Dowdeswell, who happened to know people from all over the world at this conference. Finally, we attended certain types of events, including so-called side events that take place during these conferences. I attended a conference given by the leader of the opposition, Mr. Stéphane Dion.

I'm ready to answer all possible questions, although I consider that the advice exchanged with the minister was on a confidential basis. The minister was obviously well supported by very competent, diligent, and experienced officials. Secondly, he was well briefed and obviously knew the issues--I would say more than most of us who were his advisers, because we didn't have the benefit of the briefing he got in Ottawa before going to the conference.

I must say that he was quite open in taking our advice. He was open in his availability to take our advice. He was also quite open-minded in taking on, or at least listening to more than just politely, what we had to say individually or collectively in various meetings.

That was essentially our function there, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Morton, if we can have your presentation that will be great. Then we'll get to questions.

[Ian Morton, Advisor to the Minister of Environment, the Hon. John Baird, for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference (Bali - December 2007), As an Individual]

Thank you. Good afternoon.

As a bit of context, I run a small business here in Toronto. We provide services to a utility sector here in Canada and in the United States. We work with Manitoba Hydro and B.C. Hydro. We have 30 utilities in Ontario and in the United States developing conservation-demand management programs, and we also do consulting for large corporations such as Home Depot, General Motors, Winners, and HomeSense. I employ, on a full-time basis, about 40 people here in Toronto and another 300 contractors across the country.

Formerly, before running my own business, I used to work with Pollution Probe.

I will just turn it over to the committee. My comments would parallel those of Pierre Marc. My role when in Bali was to provide advice to the minister. We were given daily access to the minister. We usually had an hour-long briefing meeting in the morning. I attended bilateral meetings with the minister and his staff whereby we'd hear positions from other countries and share Canada's position. Along with my other advisers, I had the chance to meet with our negotiators. I would comment on how proud I was as a Canadian to see the dedication, the expertise, and the passion that our negotiators had on this issue. Matt Jones and Jennifer Kerr, in particular, and Ian Shugart and David McGovern were very impressive and dedicated people who worked extremely long hours over there.

I attended many of the sessions, when I wasn't in bilateral meetings, looking at policy development and related processes that would inform Canada's position. I attended evening sessions that were either hosted by other countries or were put on by not-for-profit organizations. I did reach out a number of times to environmental groups that were attending from Canada to seek their counsel and advice and bring that back to the minister and his staff. I tried to make myself, along with our other advisers, available to both the negotiators and political staff on an as-needed basis and I participated and contributed my expertise wherever possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Great. Thank you very much.

Both of you did very well. I didn't even have to use my timer.

We'll go to Mr. McGuinty.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Dr. Johnson. It's good to see you again. It's been a long time.

Thank you very much, Mr. Morton, for joining us on the telephone. It's very kind of you to be available.

I'd like to go to both of you, because you're both extremely experienced Canadians who have been participating in these issues for some time.

You've been participating, in your case, Mr. Johnson, I know, in international negotiations for probably two decades.

Mr. Morton, I don't know if we've crossed paths before, but I think I recall you from Pollution Probe.

Can I ask you first whether you recall a time since 1992, when so much of the foundational work was laid in Rio de Janeiro, when opposition critics were not invited to participate in the official delegation of Canada to the Conference of the Parties meetings?

[Pierre Marc Johnson]

No.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Morton?

[Ian Morton]

No, I cannot, I guess is the answer to that question.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

I proceed to the government's turning-the-corner plan, because it's been a subject of debate, as it should be. It's a plan. We've been asking questions about the plan's materiality and the evidence that substantiates it, the analysis that might have been conducted to support it, and the modelling that might be there to backstop it. We've been asking since the day the plan was released if a single shred of analysis could be released to the Canadian people, released to the opposition, to show us how the government arrived at its numbers of 20% by 2020 using intensity targets, for example.

Mr. Johnson, I think when you were there you were also helping to convene some meetings and chair a few sessions and so on. Was the government's turning-the-corner plan actually presented publicly, other than to the official delegation, which we heard about through Ian Shugart, in the minister's official speech? Was there an actual presentation of the government's plan?

[Pierre Marc Johnson]

I did chair a meeting, in a so-called side event organized by the Canadian delegation, that was supposed to be made up of two elements, the first being a presentation of carbon capture and storage by industrial specialists in that field. And to my knowledge, their membership in that delegation was only as a way for them to be able to get there and to make their presentation in front of that group. I never saw them at briefings, nor did I see NGOs or other groups.

The second part of the meeting was supposed to be the presentation of that plan by the minister—and I had to excuse him, because he was called to one of the committees or groups or informal sessions precisely at the time he was supposed to make that speech.

So I didn't feel I was able to present the plan; it was not in my mandate to do so. I don't know if the minister later presented it or not. To my knowledge, he did not—but it might be different.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Then to both of you, Mr. Morton and Mr. Johnson, have you read the government's plan?

[Pierre Marc Johnson]

Yes. I saw it when it was published.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Morton?

[Ian Morton]

Yes, I have read the document, although it was some time ago, so I'm not familiar with all of the provisions in the document, and it's not in front of me at the moment.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Much of the debate that surrounded the final declaration, we understand—and some of the members around this table were present, and though I wasn't personally present, my leader was there—was about whether or not the declaration should reflect a consensus among Kyoto signatories that we would strive to achieve a 25% to 40% decrease in absolute terms from 1990. Ultimately, I understand, the minister did cave in to pressure—as we've heard from other delegations—and agreed to the declaration.

I'm just going to put this question to you straight up. Have either of you been able to reconcile the notion that the minister has said internationally that we're going to reduce our absolute greenhouse gas emissions by 25% to 40% from 1990 levels—per the document he signed on to and approved in Bali—with a domestic plan that no single third-party observer believes can achieve even a 20% cut by 2020 by using intensity targets and 2006 as the baseline year?

As two experts who have been around this climate change process for a long time, can you help us to understand this? Were you able to reconcile the government's domestic plan and its ultimate agreement with the final declaration that came out in Bali?

[Pierre Marc Johnson]

To my knowledge, the minister, in his address to the plenary session, mentioned a 20% reduction by 2020. This is what I heard him say.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Morton?

[Ian Morton]

Mr. McGuinty, I'm not a member of the government, so I can't defend its position on this.

I think at the plenary session Minister Baird did acknowledge that Canada needed to do more. And, as you point out, I think our plan to date may be insufficient for what the science is now indicating is going to be required—an 80% reduction by 2050.

Again, the Bali meetings were to outline a road map going forward, and to the government's credit, I think Canada did leave the meetings committed to that road map and to the meetings that are going to be happening this year in Poland, and for the 2009 negotiating period that's going to take us post-2012.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Did either of you advise the minister that it would be a good thing for Canada to sign on to this declaration and these targets?

[Pierre Marc Johnson]

I was not in a position to do that.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Nor was Mr. Morton, I guess.

[Ian Morton]

Correct.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Okay.

Can I ask my colleague to pick up the last couple of minutes?

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Yes, he can have a couple of minutes.