Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate, particularly after sitting here all evening and listening to the debate and being very annoyed at the gross distortion of the Reform Party position on this issue and the undignified and unwarranted personal attacks on members of the Reform Party.
The Reform Party certainly has never put forward a position that we should not do anything. That could not be further from the truth. Certainly we believe that all prudent measures to reduce emissions and pollution should be done that can be effectively done without committing economic suicide, which is what this government is bound and determined to achieve.
We neither want to commit economic suicide nor be isolated in the world by implementing a program that has no real plan, no global plan for implementation, forcing other countries around the world to participate.
I think it would be truly tragic to end up in a situation like that. For the life of me, I cannot understand how intelligent people can totally ignore any of the conflicting science on this issue. There is hard data written on pieces of paper collected by scientists that without any doubt prove that the global climate has not warmed since 1940. The data is there and is indisputable.
There are scientists who participated in the IPCC, 2,500 is the number talked about, who say that their scientific data was misinterpreted and misrepresented for political purposes.
How intelligent people can discount all those things and engage in psychological terrorism and coercing Canadians into taking some action that is going to be extremely costly and harmful to the Canadian economy is beyond me. Quite frankly, I think it is unethical and dishonest.
There must be a broad public debate and discussion in this country. We must bring ordinary Canadians into the discussion because after listening to this issue in the House, in committee and in the media, it becomes very obvious that the people who are going to pay the price are going to be the ordinary taxpayers.
Governments have engaged industry in the dialogue. Industry has presented a strong position. I think the government has listened to industry to a great degree in talks about tradable credits and the voluntary challenge program and a lot of these other things that will likely work for industry. However, industry is only one-third of the problem. Another third is the transportation sector and the other third is people themselves.
Certainly while some interests have been addressed, some certainly have not been. This shroud of secrecy over the Liberal government's position gives cause for great concern and fear in the general Canadian public and not unwarranted.
I heard the member for Ottawa West—Nepean tonight quote Maurice Strong as a world authority on this issue. Maurice Strong, for those who do not know, was the chairman in Rio who stood up and said that the only salvation of the globe was the total dismantling of the industrial society. It was the Liberal responsibility to achieve that. If that does not strike fear into the hearts of Canadians, I do not know what will.
This refusal to develop a dialogue and a position and to simply announce one-upmanship against the Americans indicates to me that the greatest interest here is not in the interest of Canada, it is in the interest of grooming someone to be a greener leader or the world's boy scout who is going to save the world faster than the next leader. I do not think that really serves us well.
The Canadian reality is that we are a huge country and a cold country with a very sparsely and disperse population and with great dependence on the resource industries. Based on that, it is important that we get this whole issue into perspective.
Canada only produces 2% of the world's greenhouse gases. China and India are huge contributors to the problem and they are not even part of this discussion. In fact, it is ludicrous that we would take leading action to solve the problem without engaging some of these other countries. If we, tomorrow morning, were to achieve the commitment that the government talks about, the achievement of 1990 levels by the year 2010, without engaging India, China and some of the other countries, it would take a mere 25 days for that benefit that Canada produced to be used up by the third world. Only 25 days and we would not have accomplished anything except to destroy our economic base in this country. I think it would be quite foolish to do that.
As I said before, what we are mostly lacking in this debate is a public debate engaging all Canadians in the issue. That has not happened and it is not likely to happen now until after Kyoto, until the government has signed a binding legal agreement that leaves it little flexibility if Canadians do not buy into this scenario.
If we think we hear emotions in the House tonight on this issue, wait until the government starts to implement this program and passes the cost of this program on to ordinary Canadians. We should think back to last winter when there was a large increase in the price of propane. For senior citizens in my riding on fixed income, the price of their heating fuel doubled and caused them great hardship. They could not afford to buy groceries. People called me from reserves in northern Alberta. They could not afford to buy heating fuel for their homes.
Look at the outrage in Toronto last summer when there was only a temporary spike in the price of gasoline. There were calls for investigation and government action immediately and it was nothing compared to what this government is proposing, I am afraid.
Canadians should be well aware of the fact that they are now paying over 60% of their income in one form of tax or another. Real take home income has been shrinking in this country for a long time thanks to ever increasing taxes. I do not really think there is a mood out there for further increases to the degree this government is proposing.
It is very important that we take a balanced approach, a careful approach, a cautious approach. We have never disputed and we do not dispute that Canada's environmental situation is in serious trouble. It is in serious trouble all around the world from a number of sources.
We heard the Conservatives talk about the wonderful things they had achieved. The member for Davenport, in spite of that wonderful achievement on cleaning up pulp mills, introduced a debate in the House about how this government has in fact exempted pulp mills and they continue to pour dioxins and furans into Canada's water system.
We have a potential Chernobyl in the suburbs of Toronto with a nuclear power plant and we have an ever growing stockpile of nuclear waste around the world that nobody has figured out what to do with.
Our environment is in serious trouble, but that does not mean we need to do the kinds of things this government is proposing to do to solve the problem. Prudent action is in order. Responsible action is in order and our party supports doing that. We just urge caution.