Environment Committee on May 17th, 2021

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Michaud, you have the floor.

[Kristina Michaud, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, BQ]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for taking the time to answer our questions.

I also thank the witnesses for being here.

Minister, the current version of Bill C-12 does not contain a GHG reduction target. In fact, subsection 7(2) states that you will establish the target within six months of the act coming into force. Yet, last April, you announced that your new target range would be a 40% to 45% reduction in GHGs by 2030, compared to that of 2005.

In question period, I asked whether your government would include this new target range in the act. Minister Guilbeault, who seems to have a fairly senior position in your department, replied that this new target would indeed be included in the act.

Can you confirm this statement?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you for your question.

Yes, the new target range of 40% to 45% that we have announced as a goal for 2030 will be a requirement of the act.

[Kristina Michaud]

We can therefore expect the government to table an amendment, for example, to remove the part of subsection 7(2) that says that the target will be established after the act comes into force, since it will be established directly in the act. Is that right?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Yes, the new target will be Canada's determined contribution.

Of course, we are open to the idea of including Canada's determined contribution as a target in the act.

[Kristina Michaud]

Okay, thank you.

If you support this idea, do you also support the idea of including a mandatory minimum target?

Let me explain. The presence of the Paris Agreement target in the act could serve as an additional judicial safeguard if more ambitious targets could not be met.

Would you also support the idea of including the Paris Agreement targets in the act, not just in the preamble of the bill, as is already the case?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

I'm not quite sure I understand your question.

However, we have announced a target for 2030, which we will include in the act. We have set it with some of our partner countries like Japan, the United States and the United Kingdom. However, if we can make more progress, we may be able to modify this target in the future.

[Kristina Michaud]

Thank you.

Speaking of partner countries, the 27 countries of the European Union and Quebec calculate their GHG reduction targets using 1990 as the base year. However, Canada has decided to use 2005. Since the increase in GHGs was quite staggering between 1990 and 2005, this choice makes a big difference, because it looks like Canada has given the oil and gas companies a 15-year break so they could pollute.

For example, in 1990, Canada emitted about 603 megatonnes of GHGs, whereas in 2005, it was 739 megatonnes. By choosing the year 2005, it is clear that the target is much less ambitious.

In fact, Canada reduced its GHGs by 9 megatonnes between 2005 and 2019. However, it increased them between 1990 and 2019.

Compared to other countries, there is a real difference because of the way the projections are calculated. Would the government be prepared to use 1990 instead of 2005 as a base year in its calculations?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you for your question.

Since it started setting a target, Canada has always used 2005 as a base year, and it will continue to do so. Many other countries use this year as a base, but you make a good point: all countries in the world must use the same base year in order to have equivalents between them and for citizens to understand.

I would also like to say that the bill you proposed in 2015 used 2005 as the base year, and a 30% reduction between 2005 and 2030.

[Kristina Michaud]

That is a very good point, Minister. I thank you for mentioning it.

For the sake of transparency towards our international partners and for the sake of honesty and clarity in the political debate, would you be in favour of setting your GHG emission targets using 1990 as the base year instead of 2005?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

As I said, Canada has always used 2005 as a base year in all the work it has done, and is thus in line with many other countries that use the same year.

However, I agree with you that we need to discuss more often with the countries of the international community so that they all use the same base year. This will make it easier to understand where countries stand in comparison to each other.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Bachrach, please go ahead.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for being with us today to answer our questions.

I understand we're covering some well-trodden ground, but I wanted to start with the matter of the 2025 milestone.

So much of the feedback and response we've heard from constituents, and from civil society, is around this perceived need for some sort of near-term milestone or accountability measure that shows we're on track. When we look at the U.K. model, one of its big successes was that, right out of the gate, they set a five-year carbon budget. It was a near-term budget that they not only met but exceeded.

Could you explain to the committee why it is so difficult, in your view, for your government to set a 2025 milestone?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

I would say to you that it is a few things. Certainly all of the work we have done and many other countries have done has been focused on achieving reductions to 2030. That was true with the pan-Canadian framework. That was certainly true also with Canada's strengthened climate plan. That was true if you watched the earth summit, in terms of the commitments that were made by Japan and the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom. They were all focused on a 2030 target.

I do think it's important—and I've heard some of the comments and the thoughts—that we think about what lies behind the request for the 2025 target, and I believe that's enhanced transparency and accountability. I have said, including in my opening remarks, that we are open to a number of improvements with respect to transparency and accountability so that programs can be tracked through the coming decade.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Minister.

It's good to hear your willingness to consider accountability measures in the near term. I believe what's being asked for is a sense that we're on track, because we've missed so many of our targets in the past. In order to determine whether we're on track, we have to define what “on track” actually means. My understanding is that your department conducts modelling exercises that essentially map out the trajectory for declining emissions between now and 2030. Could that modelling not tell us where we expect to be, if not where we need to be, in 2025?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Yes, and I think, as you will know, that modelling is an imprecise art. It is intended to essentially incorporate all of the various initiatives that the government is taking, whether those are investments or the price on [Technical difficulty—Editor] or regulatory changes to ensure that we are reducing emissions in line with our expectations. I would say the national inventory report that was released a few weeks ago showed us that we were actually on track with where we thought we would be if we were on track to meet our target.

That is why I say that having more frequent accountability reports that actually look at whether Canada is on track—and if in fact it is not on track what it's going to do to get back on track—is certainly something that we are open to, and I look forward to the conversations the committee will have.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Going back to the issue of carbon budgets versus emissions targets, I believe some of my colleagues have covered this a little bit, but I heard in one of your responses that you felt that the target approach that you have taken here “fit best within the Canadian context”.

I've heard this before but I've never heard explained what it is about the Canadian context that makes the carbon budget approach, in your view, not the best approach to take. Could you unpack that and explain precisely why you chose not to take the approach the U.K. did, which was so successful?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you for the question. I would say there are probably different ways you can approach the issue of carbon budgeting. One is on the basis of geography and the other is on the basis of sector. I would tell you that in a country like Canada, which is a federation and not a unitary state, applying a carbon budget on a provincial basis is probably not the recipe for success and for collaborative working arrangements between different levels of government.

On a sectoral basis, you're essentially assigning different levels to different sectors. What I'm saying to you is that we actually have established a target system that rolls every five years and that essentially embeds within it targets with respect to sector, because you can actually, by and large, roll that out of the overall targets. It's not that different, so I think when people are getting a little bit fussed about this, they're actually getting fussed about something that is a bit of dancing on the head of a pin.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Okay. Perhaps I'll move along to my next question, because I believe I'm running out of time. We all know that the real work here comes not in setting the targets but in the emissions reduction plans that map out the way we're going to meet those targets.

Can you confirm that the intention is for the plans that are developed under this act to demonstrate clearly how they're going to achieve the targets for each milestone year, and are you open to amendments that would require additional detail to ensure that we really understand that those plans are up to the task of meeting the targets?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

The plan is essentially intended to demonstrate how we are going to make progress towards the target. I would be a little bit careful about saying at the beginning of a period that we know necessarily everything we're going to have to do over the coming number of years in order to achieve the targets. We obviously have to know most of it, but I do think we have to account for the fact that we're going to continue to need to have climate action as we move through those years. In the same way that people have said, “Why did the government commit to a 40% to 45% target when right now it clearly knows how it's going to get to 36%?”, the answer is that Canadians will expect that the next budget and the next budget and the next budget are going to continue to prioritize climate action and we need to continue to be ambitious going forward, given the scale of the problem.

Therefore, yes, these emissions reduction plans do need to be sufficiently detailed so that we can map out how we're going to make the progress that we need to make towards the target.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thanks.

We'll go to the second round now, which will be kicked off, if I'm not mistaken, by Mr. Redekopp for five minutes.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Thank you.

Thanks, Minister, for being here.

I just want to carry on right there. You talked about the targets and the way they're changing. Of course, you would know that it was 30% with no carbon tax, then we added a carbon tax or you increased the carbon tax, and then you came out with the budget that said 36%, and I still think it's a typo because a few days later the Prime Minister corrected it to 40% to 45%. I was speaking with some stakeholders who were caught unaware of these increases until they saw them on social media.

You speak of collaboration. Between when the budget was released on April 19 and when the Prime Minister announced the targets on April 22, who specifically did you consult and who did you collaborate with during that 60-hour window on these new increased targets?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

Certainly we had lots of conversations with respect to Canadians about what they expect of their government with respect to climate ambition. I will tell you that in the online survey that was developed and implemented, over 90% of Canadians were looking for a much more ambitious target. However, beyond that, we consulted with provinces and territories and with the major indigenous organizations, discussing the need for enhanced ambition, and at the end of the day we've made significant progress in the budget to get to 36%, which is well below the initial target.

Canadians would just think that we were crazy, in the face of a climate crisis, if we said, “Oh, we're done; we're not going to do anything for the next nine years.” That would just be ridiculous. There is a need for ambition and it needs to be attainable. There's a need for ambition and that's what the new target represents.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

I agree totally. Attainability is really key here.

Again, specifically, if you're saying you did collaborate and consult with people between this increase from 36% to 40% to 45%, if I call the minister of the environment in Saskatchewan, would he tell me that he received a phone call from you during those 60 hours about consultations? What other people did you speak to?