Evidence of meeting #17 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was targets.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Mark Warawa Conservative Langley, BC
My understanding is that Mr. Bigras is removing his amendment, and he was going to be....
Conservative
Conservative
Mark Warawa Conservative Langley, BC
My understanding, though, is that he is asking for a friendly amendment to Mr.—
Conservative
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
He's amending his amendment. He's friendly amending his amendment.
Go ahead, Mr. Vellacott.
Conservative
Maurice Vellacott Conservative Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK
So then paragraph (b) still reads, at the end of that: “with meeting the commitment made under section 5 and the interim Canadian greenhouse gas”.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
That stays, yes.
We're coming back to that, because now we'll deal with the NDP. But right now we're just talking about Mr. Bigras' amendment, and his amendment adds to subclause 9(c).
Conservative
Maurice Vellacott Conservative Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK
It would then read: “making, amending or repealing the necessary regulations under this or any other Act” in conformity--
Conservative
Conservative
Maurice Vellacott Conservative Saskatoon—Wanuskewin, SK
Again, I just wanted to make the point that in our Turning the Corner plan, we, I think, have set the tone for developing a global framework for climate change and for positioning Canada to be a leader, actually, in respect of that by achieving that 20% reduction from 2006 levels by 2020 and a 60% to 70% reduction by 2050.
So I think again, for the sake of the record, we need to make plain where our party has stood. Well in advance of this bill or any other coming forward, we have been moving on these things.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
Thank you, Mr. Vellacott.
Are there any other comments?
So we're voting, then, on the amended BQ-3.
(Amendment agreed to)
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
We're now, then, on NDP-3, which is on page 14.
I will ask Mr. Cullen to speak to that, please.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Thank you, Chair.
This clause refers back quite a bit to clause 7 in general. In terms of laying out those targets, this is the clause that now talks about how it is that government goes about achieving these targets. We wanted to tighten up a couple of pieces in the legislation on this. One is with respect to the timelines. Well in advance of where the government is headed, it has to report back to the Canadian public as to what achievements have been made and then declare itself with respect to its next target.
This is an accountability measure, again, as we've seen in other amendments we've made, that's been lacking. A lot of these changes are going to flow from the now adopted changes we've made in clause 7, and committee members can look through the rest.
There's one shorter timeline for the first target date. That's because we're now into 2008. But subsequent to that, there's a healthy amount of notice for the Canadian public to see--whatever the government of the day, whatever its political stripe--that this is what the law requires them to publish and to then conform their actions to. We think this type of accountability measure is long overdue when it comes to dealing with climate change in this country.
That's it.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
As you can see, then, we are adding a section to this, as you read it, which has been explained by Mr. Cullen.
Go ahead, Mr. Warawa.
Conservative
Mark Warawa Conservative Langley, BC
Chair, regarding this amendment from Mr. Cullen, as was already pointed out by Mr. Vellacott, the government, in its Turning the Corner plan, has historically the toughest targets in Canadian history. We provide international leadership. Those targets are a 20% reduction of 2006 levels by 2020. That's only 12 years from now, Mr. Chairman. Those are dramatic: 150 megatonnes. On the long-term targets, the 2050 targets, they're reductions of 60% to 70%. Again, these are some of the toughest in Canadian history.
Our government is committed to meaningful consultations with its partners. It'll take the appropriate time to gather the best information available, working with other levels of government—that's already happening—as well as with industry and individuals, to develop regulations. So it's already happening in a very realistic way.
Thank you.
Liberal
John Godfrey Liberal Don Valley West, ON
I have two very picky points. I notice that we now list this amendment as (2), so I assume that we would have to go back into the text and put a (1) beside (a) because--
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
There's an editorial problem there, and that would be fixed during--
Liberal
John Godfrey Liberal Don Valley West, ON
Then the other slight picky thing--I'm trying to be like Mr. Watson--is that I'm not sure you could just lead off with “regulations” from a grammatical point of view, because the paragraph that leads into this says “fully meets the interim Canadian greenhouse gas emissions targets referred to in section 6 by”, and then you've got subclause (1), and then I'm not sure if you can have “by regulations”? Maybe you could have “by passing regulations” or “creating regulations”, some form of word that is appropriately legislative. Maybe you can have “by regulations”. I don't know.
What do you think? Does it matter? It's a very small grammatical point, but I just wanted to make sure that--
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bob Mills
So we would have subclause 9(1) for what's there, and then we start subclause 9(2) with “Regulations to ensure”. I think that's where the (2) would fit in. We would insert the (1).