Environment Committee on March 12th, 2026

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

The new schedule that was sent to us includes a meeting on the carbon tax on March 24, with witnesses.

On March 26, we'll discuss the effectiveness of and potential improvements to the 2030 emissions reduction plan, which refers, among other things, to the much-talked-about net-zero advisory board. Based on that schedule, I think representatives from that board could be brought in on March 26, and that would allow us to get a better understanding of their role in relation to the emissions reduction plan. I see no problem with the schedule.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

Mrs. Miedema, you have the floor.

[Shannon Miedema, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

We have a backlog of work in this committee. We saw how slowly things went on Tuesday this week, and we have a lot of priority work already planned and scheduled. I think we need to triage what is critically important here. The minister herself said that she's meeting Friday with the net-zero advisory board.

I just need to clarify that the size of the board has not diminished; there are just vacancies, so it's not, Mr. Leslie, a shrunken board.

I really don't understand why we would want to keep throwing things into our very full calendar. We're not going to get these reports out and these studies done that were the work proposed by the other parties. I'd like to throw it in ahead of completing the work we're doing now. Starting the industrial carbon study makes absolutely no sense to me, and I reject the notion of scheduling it for March 26.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

Mr. Fanjoy, the floor is yours.

[Bruce Fanjoy, Liberal, Carleton, ON]

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair.

I agree. We have these motions that keep being dropped. It seems that their intent is ultimately to prevent us from getting to work that we've already committed to working on. As has been noted before, we have a limited number of committee days in which to address the work we've committed to. We have an ERP study that we have to continue to work through and finalize. I think we're creating distractions that are preventing this committee from doing the work we've already committed to.

In principle, I'm not against having witnesses attend at some point in the future, but dropping things in at the last minute that suddenly become our top priority does not strike me as good practice.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

Thank you, Mr. Fanjoy.

Go ahead, Mr. St-Pierre.

[Eric St-Pierre, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

I might want to add to that, because there was a motion for the water study, which is a comprehensive 400 pages or something, and we have the ERP study, which we're making some progress on, but a lot more work is required. Does this push us back? Are we going to be here over the summer? I'm still trying to understand the urgency of March 26, which is literally the next meeting.

From a policy perspective, I think the industrial carbon price, as the Canadian Climate Institute has said, is one of the most effective climate policies for this country. Whether we agree on it or not is another issue, but I think it's a really important piece of policy. It's a piece of policy that our government is taking very seriously. It would be very informative and provide really important analysis and recommendations. I'm wondering.... We are delaying work on the industrial carbon price for something we can study at a later point, but is it urgent? It's almost a question of priorities.

This is more of a comment, but I'll leave it there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

Thank you.

We have Mr. Leslie and then Mr. Bonin.

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I do appreciate the clerk's highlighting the challenges. If we sit on a Friday, we can't sit during question period, I don't believe, so we'd have to move our typical slot. It's perhaps more complicated. I like the idea of having a date, and I appreciate my colleague's proposing it. I'm not sure if that's necessary. I'll leave that to him if he has any comments.

What I find interesting is the nerve that seems to have been struck here. There have been apparent efforts to filibuster the environment committee over the invitation to the one co-chair and the other member who have resigned from the net-zero advisory body. The minister was clearly frustrated earlier by being asked questions about this topic.

I'm just curious as to whether we can expect the committee to stop filibustering this, get to a vote and let the members of this committee decide whether or not they want to invite these witnesses and ask for these documents in an effort to provide the full transparency that taxpayers fully deserve.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

Mr. Bonin, you have the floor.

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I agree with my colleague's remarks. I think it's obvious that our colleagues on the other side don't want to have these witnesses appear before us. However, they're witnesses who decided to leave a board that was set up and that seemed very important to the government. It was the co-chair of the organization, a highly renowned climatologist, who decided to leave.

Our colleagues don't want to hear from these two witnesses and they don't even want us to adopt this motion. I don’t think that is consistent with their alleged desire to accelerate the fight against climate change. I think we should move to a vote.

I thank the clerk for informing us about March 26. If this date is a problem and needs to be changed because the Thursday ends up being treated like a Friday, obviously, we can just remove the date without any problem.

I won't propose an amendment to Mrs. Anstey's motion to set a date, because there’s a bit of confusion about whether that date would work. Let's adopt the motion and get to the crux of the matter. I know my Liberal colleagues would prefer we didn't. They clearly want us to waste our time talking about a motion, instead of hearing from very relevant witnesses who are highly renowned in Canada. It's very surprising to see my colleague act this way.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

I'll leave it to the clerk to direct us on the issue of March 26, since there is still some confusion.

Mr. Clerk, you have the floor.

I'll let him highlight that date, please.

[The Clerk of the Committee, Leif-Erik Aune]

I don't have the text of the motion adopted by the House in front of me. However, the wording is essentially that when the House adjourns on Thursday, March 26, it shall stand adjourned until Monday, April 13. I'm going to double-check this, but the motion does not prescribe that the program for Thursday, March 26 be a Friday program. As a result, question period would not interfere with the committee's usual meeting time of 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

We go back to the drawing board.

Mrs. Miedema.

[Shannon Miedema, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have deep respect for the net-zero advisory body, and I happen to know Ms. Abreu very well.

Similar to my comments earlier this week, if we were going to invite two former members of the board, why would we not also invite some current members of the board to get a more fulsome picture?

However, I'm going to talk now about not just being an MP but also being a representative of a coastal community that's already living the reality of a changing climate, because this is the environment and climate change committee, and when you—

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

A point of order is being raised, Mrs. Miedema.

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

During the commentary, could you define filibuster for us?

[Shannon Miedema, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

That's not a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

Thank you very much.

Mrs. Miedema, the floor is yours.

[Shannon Miedema, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

[Inaudible—Editor] invent filibustering, Mr. Leslie? I don't know.

When you represent a coastal riding, as many of my colleagues know, even across the table, you're not able to treat climate change as a theoretical debate or a distant future problem. The environment drives our economy and shapes our culture, and it increasingly threatens rural, urban, coastal and central communities alike through extreme weather events.

In Nova Scotia, we're not waiting for climate change to arrive, because it is already here. We saw it in 2022, when hurricane Fiona tore through the Atlantic provinces. It destroyed homes, devastated our coastlines and left communities in the dark—literally. I saw it first-hand in my riding of Halifax in 2023, when the Upper Tantallon wildfires forced residents to abandon their homes and filled our skies with smoke. We see it in the historic flash flooding that washed away roads and infrastructure, and in the rising sea levels that threaten the very foundation of the Halifax peninsula.

Let me be super clear about this. The science is settled. The debates over whether climate change is real and over whether human activity is the primary driver have been over for decades. The work of this committee is to advance action on climate and the environment. The global scientific community is unequivocal. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is unequivocal. Our own Canadian scientists are unequivocal.

In Nova Scotia, our provincial climate risk assessments paint a very stark picture. By 2050, we're looking at significant temperature increases and a severe rise in extreme weather events. We're expecting an increase in relative sea level of up to a metre by the year 2100. That's going to devastate our coastal communities, which should concern many members of this committee.

Our oceans are warming, becoming more acidic and losing oxygen, which is a direct threat to our vital fisheries and marine ecosystems. We're even facing new and emerging threats to our fresh water quality because of heavier rainfall and warming lakes, which is also a problem for many members of this committee—in fact, all of them. We all depend on our freshwater resources for our very survival.

To stand in this committee or anywhere in this country and attempt to cast doubt on any of these facts is irresponsible. It's failing to fulfill our collective duty to the Canadians we were elected to protect. To try to interfere with the good progress this committee is trying to make across its approved studies and witnesses who have been invited is also irresponsible.

The science is settled, and it's past time that our political discourse reflected that reality, which brings me to the core of why I'm speaking to this now. If the science is settled and the impacts are devastatingly clear, why haven't we taken all of the necessary steps to address the climate crisis? Sadly, the answer lies with our political institutions. Too often, the fight for our planet is derailed by cheap political plays and hyperpartisanship. Climate change is the greatest existential threat of our time, yet it's routinely reduced to a wedge issue, or we just play little games that waste time in committee meetings that are intended to be very serious. It's seen as a tool to score cheap points in the polls, rather than as a crisis demanding a unified, national response.

[An hon. member]

Oh, oh!

[Shannon Miedema, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

I am red because I am worked up, dear colleague. We have something like 1,000 motions interfering with the due process of this committee, and I am very unhappy about it, as I have indicated many days in these past months. We see progress stalled by manufactured outrage, by short-term thinking that prioritizes the next election cycle over the next generation, and by the deliberate spreading of misinformation.

The atmosphere does not care about our political stripes. Wildfires don't check the polls to see if a riding leans blue or leans red. The storm surge that floods our coastal communities doesn't ask about party affiliation. Unfortunately, we've seen this dynamic play out even at this very committee.

At a time when Canadians are facing record insured losses from extreme weather and communities are rebuilding after fires, floods and storms, Conservative members choose to cast aside many witnesses their own party invited and waste valuable committee time with these motions. Witnesses are invited, taxpayer dollars are spent, staff time is used and witnesses invest their time in preparing and coming, and we need to stop derailing our planned calendar.

What makes this especially concerning is that committee time is one of Parliament's most limited and valuable resources. Witnesses clear their schedules, experts prepare evidence and communities across Canada look to this table, expecting serious study and constructive recommendations so that we can actually move forward in a good way together. When that time is redirected towards motions that don't advance our current study, it undermines the very purpose of committee work.

Canadians dealing with rising insurance costs and repeated climate disasters deserve better than procedural distraction. At a time when insurers are withdrawing coverage from high-risk areas, when municipalities are struggling to finance adaptation infrastructure and when families are questioning whether their homes will remain insurable in the years ahead, our responsibility is clear. This is why we are trying to move forward with the work of this committee and get everything done that we need to do.

We should be hearing from emergency managers, climate scientists, housing experts and financial institutions about solutions, not revisiting debates designed to stall progress. Healthy disagreement strengthens democracy, but obstruction disguised as study weakens public trust. Canadians can tell the difference between good-faith scrutiny and tactics intended to run out the clock.

You can laugh, but this is important. We can't keep doing this. This is my way of telling you that we cannot keep doing this. If this committee is to meet the seriousness of the moment, we have to remain focused on evidence-based work: work that helps communities adapt, reduces risk and protects Canadians from the economic consequences of climate change.

The opposition has wasted valuable committee time by proposing other meaningless studies, like the one on single-use plastics. This is an issue that has already been extensively studied by Parliament. The single-use plastic ban is a landmark achievement of this government, and it presents a significant step in stopping pollution and building a cleaner economy.

Canadians expect this committee to focus on climate resilience, disaster preparedness—

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Chair, I have a point of order.

[Shannon Miedema, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

—industrial carbon pricing, protecting homes and livelihoods—

[The Chair, Liberal, Angelo Iacono]

I'm sorry, Mrs. Miedema. I'll give you a second to breathe.

Mr. Bonin has a point of order.