It is absolutely clear from our membership that we are opposed to fossil fuel subsidies. We need to get to a place where renewable energy, energy efficiency and clean technology operate on a level playing field with fossil fuel infrastructure. If we continue to subsidize the fossil fuel industry, then those industries that are emerging in the green economy will continue to be at a disadvantage.
Your use of the word "priority" is right. At this point, it's a question of where we decide to invest our limited resources, whether those are fiscal or political resources. If we continue to invest them in the growing fossil fuel industry in Canada, which is already the largest and fastest-growing source of carbon emissions in this country, then we will continue to have a poverty of resources that we can invest in solutions, whether those solutions are building retrofits for the 70% of buildings that are standing today and will still be standing into the 2040s and 2050s, or whether they are investments in affordable housing or energy-efficient public transportation.
We're getting to a point now where we need to have that sticky conversation. It isn't necessarily one of collapsing our fossil fuel industry tomorrow, which is something that organizations like mine often get accused of wanting. It is about taking the time that we have to make a plan that protects the planet and, very importantly, protects people.