Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to address Bill C-43 at report stage, and more specifically Motions Nos. 5 and 6 presented by the Conservative Party and currently before the House.
The purpose of these amendments is to ensure that the Canadian government—and I emphasize that, the Canadian government—cannot buy foreign pollution credits with public funds, with the taxes paid by taxpayers. This is not to say that Canada must not take part in the system to exchange emission credits that is already provided for in the Kyoto protocol. Rather, it means that it is out of the question for the government to use public funds to buy these pollution credits.
Why is it important to include these amendments in Bill C-43? Because we must set limits on the actions of the agency that we are talking about today.
In recent years, the federal government first off failed to meet its international commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. While Canada was to cut these emissions by 6%, they have in fact increased by 20% since 1990. The government presented us with a plan in 2002 in which it provided that we would limit purchase of emission credits abroad to approximately 10 megatonnes. We could have accepted this objective and this burden.
However, we saw in the green plan the government presented in recent weeks that it had removed the limit on the credits it could purchase abroad. So, the government has increased Canada's likelihood of achieving its objectives not by reducing greenhouse gas emissions at source, but by looking for and buying emission credits abroad. That is where the problem lies.
If Canadian businesses want to purchase emission credits on the international market, so be it. I do not think it is up to the federal government to intervene in such a market mechanism. Businesses will be able to make use of a future emission credit exchange. It could be based in Chicago, as is the current pilot project, or in Montreal. It does not matter. Businesses have the time to do it.
What we do not want, once again, is for the government to go buying pollution credits, using public taxes to acquire them. The public wants greenhouse gas emissions reduced at source. They want the government to invest in sectors where we could achieve greenhouse gas reductions, whether it be in the industrial, transportation or rail sector.
That is why we must support this Conservative Party amendment. We have to support it because businesses have already taken part in this mechanism. I said it earlier. Alcan, TransAlta, Péchiney and other Canadian companies have taken advantage of this international trading mechanism that we are adopting. But, when the government says that if we agree to the Conservative Party's amendments, businesses will not be able to take part in a credit trading system, this is not true.
If this new agency acted as an international broker, it could work. However, we have no such guarantee. We want the other side of the House to guarantee that the government will not try to walk away from its commitments on domestic reductions on the Canadian market by purchasing foreign credits.
By creating this agency, we are opening this door. We simply want to close it again.
In fact, the government has told us that buying hot air or purchasing foreign pollution credits from countries that reduced their emissions as a result of an economic downturn was out of the question. We want this guarantee, which the agency does not give us.
We must support these recommendations, because they are what the government's commitment in recent years is all about. Canada has tried everything, in the wake of a policy that not only did not reach its objectives but led to a major increase in greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, an additional burden is being placed on industries that have made an effort in the past.
This plan, which has been tabled and which would allow Canada more than ever to purchase credits abroad, is unacceptable. With this plan, the government has allowed the purchase of emission credits abroad. Even worse, with Bill-43, it has established and accredited the mechanism for such purchases abroad.
If the government really believes, first, that any climate change plan should focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions at the source and, second, that public investments should be made here, in Canada, while preventing as much as possible the flight of capital from Canada, it will support the amendments in Motions Nos. 5 and 6. This is really only to ensure that Canada will honour its commitments.
Canada is made up of more than just businesses. It is made up of the government, businesses and citizens. This amendment would prevent the Canadian government from shirking its responsibilities by buying emission credits abroad. Greenhouse gas emission reduction targets will nonetheless be imposed on industry.
By the way, these reduction targets are unfair to Quebec's businesses and to its industrial and manufacturing sectors, which are Quebec's economic base. Quebec wants to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 4% and by even more in some sectors. These will have reduction targets similar to those imposed on large industrial emitters, whose greenhouse gas emissions have increased by 30%. The marginal cost to these Quebec businesses, which have made efforts in the past, is likely to be much higher than that of other businesses in major industrial sectors which sat on their hands in the past.
What is needed is a fair and equitable system. We, on this side of the House, will never support any attempt to establish a mechanism that will encourage the flight of capital from Canada and we will never support a mechanism allowing the government to buy emission credits abroad. We believe that the money of Quebeckers and Canadians ought to be invested at home, so that greenhouse gas emissions can truly be reduced at the source.
Therefore, we have to support these motions in amendment, which will prevent the Canadian government from buying emission credits abroad to shirk its responsibilities and international commitments.