Mr. Speaker, first I would like to join those who have already expressed their condolences to the family of our friend, Ron Duhamel, with whom I had the pleasure of working on a number of issues, including veterans affairs when he was the Minister of Veterans Affairs.
I remember visiting the veterans' hospital with him, not too long ago, before leaving his position. He was wearing a wig. He told me how difficult it was dealing with the first effects of cancer.
He was a remarkable man for whom I had a great deal of esteem. Once again, I offer my condolences to his family.
I was in Norway in August and I had the opportunity to speak with Norway's secretary of state for the environment. He told me about the pride their country had taken in ratifying the Kyoto protocol. Norway was one of the first countries to do so, even before the European Union.
He told me that Norway, which is one of the largest producers and exporters of oil and gas in the world, would finance its Kyoto plan in part through royalties from Norway's oil companies.
What an incredible contrast with Premier Klein of Alberta, who is threatening to leave the federation, to separate from us because of the Kyoto accord. Today, we heard the leader of the official opposition tell us that his party would use every possible trick to block the Kyoto process and that it would join the provinces opposed to the protocol to ensure that it is never ratified. Some confidence.
Yet, the evidence is clear. For a number of years now, the United Nations have mandated 2,500 top level scientists. These people have come to the conclusion that the anthropological contribution to climate change, that is the human impact, is very significant. These experts urged us to act as quickly as possible and to change our way of doing things and of living.
Kyoto is far from perfect. No international agreement is. We could review them all; international agreements are never perfect. Yet, this is a collective resolution taken by countries, particularly rich and industrialized countries, to change their ways of doing things, to live differently, to create and to produce things differently in order to save our planet.
The fact is that, ironically, the richest and most fortunate countries are the ones that did all the damage. These are the same countries that benefited the most from the past few decades of unbridled development. At the same time, innocent nations, including small insular ones, have suffered from the causes generated by rich and developed countries.
These innocent nations are telling us “What did we do to deserve this? You better change your ways of doing things and your lifestyles as quickly as possible”.
Kyoto is a planetary question no doubt, but above all it is a question of international equity. We owe it to innocent nations to change our ways and do something about it. Kyoto represents a collective process, a collective resolve to change our ways. Given our tremendous skills as a country and given our bountiful resources, Canada remains the dwarf of renewable energies.
Statistics abound in wind energy. For instance, Germany produces 6,000 megawatts. A small country like Denmark produces 2,500 megawatts and has created thousands of jobs out of wind energy. Canada has barely reached 200 megawatts.
In solar energy Japan has reached 128 megawatts while Canada is barely at 2 megawatts. In solar energy, a poor country like India is way ahead of us. It has the second largest wind farm in the world and has invested $450 million U.S. in a project to provide solar energy to residential homes.
The other day I was listening to an interview with the deputy CEO of British Petroleum, Mr. Rodney Chase, on As It Happens . He explained that in the last eight years BP, an oil producer, has reduced its emissions by 10% compared to 1990 without spending an additional penny. He said that production had gone up by 5.5% despite it, and it will continue with the trend on these projectionsd now to 2005 without any penalty to BP.
Ironically, Calgary, the city of the Premier of Alberta, has installed solar collectors for its bus barns. It is using wind power to propel its C-train in the city.
The winners of the 2000 energy efficiency awards in housing received their award because they improved the efficiency of their homes compared to the R-2000 standard by 25% to 42%. The Office of Energy Efficiency stated that for an investment of $4,000, over the years people could reduce their energy bills by 25% each year. Yet Canada still uses the additive MMT manganese and is one of the only industrial nations to use MMT in our gasoline when biofuels could be used and produced in quantity.
Canada is the dwarf of renewable energy. Kyoto will help us change our ways. It will in fact force us to change our ways.
The Leader of the Opposition never mentioned the benefits to our health. How can we disassociate the environment from health? How can we disassociate health from the environment? The figures which have been produced by the Minister of the Environment in the option paper show savings of $500 million a year to a health program due to better air quality. That is $5 billion a year in the 10 years that we would have to reach our Kyoto target of 6%. The naysayers only produce negative statistics such as the loss of 450,000 jobs and yet they do not know how this will happen.
I would like to read from the interview held with the deputy CEO of BP. He is not just talking statistics and making wild statements. He said this about climate change:
...our view is, we can't prove that, and we'd rather get on with taking action that we don't have any regrets about. Things that we can do that in case the world is actually heating up and it's to do with us, in case the weather is turning against us and it's our fault, we can take these actions with no regrets, and it doesn't trade off jobs and the standards of living in the developed world. Now that's our view, and the practice that we've pursued over the last four years has not changed our mind at all. In fact, its encouraging us to say we can do a heck of a lot more to prevent emissions of greenhouse before we begin to approach the problem at which our industrial effectiveness is threatened.
The idea that we threaten our economic effectiveness because of Kyoto or because of climate change is again a bogus argument.
I applaud the government for taking the stand that ratification must happen before December. We have to take leadership to show the world that we are part of a collective resolve, an international regrouping to change our ways of thinking, to change our ways of living and to practise equity toward the innocent nations that we ourselves have harmed with our own pollution.
I will applaud the government when it produces the bill to ratify and I will stand four-square behind it.