Public Accounts Committee on Feb. 8th, 2022

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

I agree completely. The decisions and choices that we make today are definitely going to affect the lives of future generations, so it's extremely important that we involve them as much as possible in the decision-making process. How can the principle of intergenerational equity be incorporated into institutional decision-making?

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Please give a short answer.

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

Lesson 8 is a call to parliamentarians to ask questions like that. We've provided some questions about intergenerational equity. Essentially, as I said before, we have to expand our ambit of concern, get past just short-term expediency and move towards longer-term planning in looking at generations to come in terms of the effects of present-day decisions.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Thank you.

Madame Sinclair-Desgagné, you have two and a half minutes. Please go ahead.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

My question is for Mr. Viau and follows on from our discussion earlier, in the last round.

You used a strong term about investment in the oil sector; you spoke of dependence. And so great ills require great remedies.

What concrete solutions would you like the current government to implement, and to implement quickly?

[Marc-André Viau]

Indeed, I used a strong word, because it is true that we are experiencing a dependence on fossil fuels at the moment. A big part of our economy is based on the use and development of this resource.

What are the solutions? This was discussed earlier in the conversation. We talked about a just transition, which is also called a fair transition. A just transition is a key to breaking the chains of this dependency and providing alternatives to communities that depend on the extraction of these natural resources.

So this is a reality that is recognized. There needs to be a plan in place, and obligations, in the same way that obligations were put in place in Bill C‑12, which became law, to which the commissioner was referring earlier.

So there must be government obligations to workers and communities. Plans are being developed and announcements were made during the election campaign. Now they need to materialize. As a priority, a just transition plan is needed, that is, strong legislation to ensure a fair and just transition for workers and communities.

There is also another aspect, which was also mentioned earlier, namely fossil fuel subsidies. As the commissioner said, fossil fuel subsidies must be abolished and we must ensure that fossil fuels are no longer subsidized. We are no longer just talking about abolishing “inefficient” subsidies; we have dropped that word, which is a good thing. Now, the last thing...

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Thank you very much. We will now move on—

[Marc-André Viau]

Madam Chair, I'm finishing up my reply.

The last thing we need to do is make sure that fossil fuel subsidies are not replaced by other subsidies, such as those for carbon capture and storage.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Thank you.

Mr. Desjarlais, you have two and a half minutes.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I'll be quick.

I want to return to the topic of young people with the commissioner. I'm the critic for youth for my party. I'm also the youngest member of this committee. I have done as much extraordinary work as I can in my own circles to educate my family and my community about what this impact could mean. I was also Alberta's indigenous climate change chair for uniting indigenous governments for a few years, and we have seen unique challenges in holding the government accountable. I want to specifically mention accountability.

Young people are organizing across the country. This is truly a crisis that is going to affect not just this generation but many more. My children and I and many people here whose families have children know this kind of fear.

My question is specifically on what we need to do to hold the federal government accountable for the promises it's made. What do young people have to do to hold them accountable? We've done as much as we can. You noticed, I think, some of the work that young people have done, but now when it comes down to accountability, what can young people do to hold the government accountable?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

Beyond waiting till they're allowed to vote, they have quite a few years in which they can have their voices heard. Since being a relatively young person at the 1992 Rio conference, I've noticed that there has been a sea change since then both in terms of the climate getting worse and also in terms of the voices being heard by much younger people than I was back then as a university student.

It's a positive change to see that movement and mobilization of young people having their voices heard and, of course, the democratization of information through the Internet and so on has facilitated that. Are we just going to allow them to voice their concerns, or are we going to act on them? That's really the question now, and that's why we ended the report on lesson number 8 in terms of intergenerational equity, because we do hold this planet and this country in trust for the future generations. We need to figure out how to make decisions that further that trust rather than breach it.

I can't give you specific examples of all the ways of doing that, but it is something that really needs to be done. We need to take seriously our obligations to future generations rather than just using it as a mantra or a buzzword. It's been codified in Canadian law already, but it hasn't been operationalized.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Just quickly, so on the one—

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Thank you. I'm sorry, but we're done.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Now we move on for five minutes to Mr. Bragdon.

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and Commissioner and to others who have appeared here today.

I just want to start with a question for you, Commissioner. Do you know how many megatonnes of carbon have been reduced due to the carbon tax?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

I don't have that number off the top of my head, but I would say that having a carbon levy or pricing carbon is consistent with the principles of cost internalization and polluter pays, which are in Canadian law, and the Supreme Court of Canada has talked about the importance of carbon pricing as one of the important tools for addressing climate change—

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you, Commissioner. I only have a short time, and there are a few questions I want to ask you in follow up.

Basically we don't know yet how many megatonnes of carbon have been reduced as a result of the carbon tax that has been in place in some jurisdictions for now over a decade here in Canada. So, we don't really have a metric. We're not sure if it has been successful, but we do know, however, that the cost of living for Canadians has gone up substantially due to various pressures, inflationary pressures, including the carbon tax, and yet we're not sure if it's having any impact on the reduction of carbon in the environment.

Then we go a step further. We can also probably deduce that this is most likely having a far more consequential impact on low-income Canadians living in rural Canada. So it's disproportionately affecting those in rural Canada as well as those who are more likely to be at a lower income level than other Canadians.

Is there a justification for the carbon tax approach if we can't even measure what we're seeing and we don't have a report? We don't have a study that says that so far this approach is working. A follow-up question to that is, if we are to put a price on carbon and we're not having impact to this point, by how much more do we have to increase the cost of living of Canadians in order to have an impact that would in fact reduce carbon?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

There's a lot there. To start, we're very interested in the issue. We're undertaking an audit on carbon pricing, so stay tuned for that report from us later this year.

I would not agree with the proposition that it is not having an impact. I answered the question of whether I knew the exact number of megatonnes that the impact has been. That's a different question from whether there has been any impact.

Economic modelling has shown that pricing-in previous externalities such as greenhouse gas emissions can affect behaviour in a positive way if the price is at a level that signals enough to the consumer or to the producer to change that and so on. It is considered to be an efficient means of bringing about behaviour modification and therefore reducing emissions if the price is at a level that's high enough to make those changes.

Stay tuned for our carbon pricing report on that. We'll have more to say about that later this year.

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

We look forward to that. I think that's going to be very important to us being able to move forward and ascertain the effect of this with that approach.

We also know—I think it's been established—that other jurisdictions that have not implemented a carbon tax have, as a result, seen even greater reductions in their carbon footprint on a per capita basis while expanding their energy sectors.

I believe that is out there, so is there perhaps merit in looking at what may be better approaches that actually achieve better results in reducing carbon without disproportionately affecting the cost of living for average Canadians?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

We have to look at cost of living from both sides. We also have the cost of living with a hotter planet. You've seen the flooding, the heatwaves and the wildfires that also cost Canadians in terms of their pocketbooks, and for some people, their lives. We have to look at both sides of that equation in terms of the cost of climate change.

We have to adapt to not only climate change—because we didn't act soon enough—but we also to the measures we're putting in place to address it, such as carbon pricing, while not leaving behind the people you mentioned, such as people in rural areas or indigenous communities and so on, who might be disproportionately affected by high heating costs or something like that.

The federal government needs to look at a way to move that transition forward without leaving people behind and causing them to disproportionately pay for the common good of addressing the climate crisis.

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Madam Chair, do I have any time or is that it?

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

No, that is it.

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Jean Yip]

Thank you for asking.

Now we move on to Mr. Dong, for five minutes.