Mr. Speaker, it is with pleasure that I have the opportunity to speak to the motion moved by the member for Winnipeg Centre. I will repeat the motion as it is very prudent for us to break it down into its parts.
The motion reads:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should invest in a comprehensive energy efficiency strategy—
The Progressive Conservative Party indeed agrees with that.
—thus: (a) exploiting the considerable job creation potential of energy efficiency; (b) encouraging the development of high tech expertise and export opportunities; and (c) increasing the number of federally owned buildings (of which there are 50,000) retrofitted for energy efficiency through the Federal Buildings Initiative.
I want to talk about the primary origin of why this particular debate is becoming very topical. It comes down to the fact that just over a year ago the industrialized world and emerging nations attended a conference in Kyoto to make a tangible approach to cut down carbon dioxide emissions and fight the serious challenge of climate change.
Over the last 40 to 60 years the use of fossil fuels which we use to heat our homes and drive our automobiles has proliferated the amount of greenhouse gases within our environment. We are now seeing a number of extreme weather events. Last year the ice storm affected my riding of Fundy—Royal. It affected our cousins in the United States and many of our cousins in the province of Quebec. These severe weather conditions are products of what can happen with the continuance of global warming. It is prudent for us to look at this issue.
The government needs to engage in more energy efficiency. Canada has an export driven economy, an economy that relies on our natural resources and an economy that is industrially based. The industrialized world said just over a year ago that it would be investing in energy efficiency initiatives and research and development on renewable sources of energy in order to address the challenge of climate change.
President Clinton and Vice-President Al Gore touched on the fact that the Americans would be spending over $7 billion on energy efficiency initiatives. This issue is just as much a trade issue from the Canadian perspective as it is an environmental issue. One thing we do know is that when the Americans want to engage in a particular topic they usually do it quite well. Given that the Americans will be spending over $7 billion on energy efficiency and they can start spending that money before the senate or the congress actually ratifies the Kyoto protocol, it is a myth that we should wait until it is ratified.
Once the Americans start spending some cash on energy efficiency is when we have to begin. If our American cousins start running their industries in a more energy efficient and cost competitive manner, it would have some very negative implications on our country's competitiveness, on our ability to trade and on the ability of our industries to compete on a cost perspective with our American cousins.
The government speaks quite often about the need to reward early action in terms of climate change. Canadians would be very happy even with some action in terms of actually pushing to ensure that we follow the same initiatives as our trading partners in the EU and the United States.
We do not necessarily see this as an issue that has really caught on with respect to the public, even though the science is definitely very clear. I say that with a little jest because the current government, as we were reviewing the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, built an environmental coalition with the Reform Party. The Reform Party still disputes whether the science on climate change is real. That party probably would, on a different day if it thought it was advantageous, argue that cigarette smoking was actually healthy.
In 1987 a conference was held in Montreal, known as the Montreal protocol. The Canadian government was the principal government in the world and led the world community in making firm commitments to the reduction of ozone depleting gases. That said, ozone depleting gases became something that was in the forefront. The public mindset was that ozone depleting gases were a bad thing for our environment. The government has yet to make that kind of initiative in terms of getting this into the public domain in terms of the need to fight climate change and reduce gas emissions.
I thank hon. members for the opportunity to speak here this evening. The Progressive Conservative Party will be supporting this motion by the member for Winnipeg Centre.