Madam Speaker, I put a question on March 5 to the government. The Minister of the Environment popped up immediately to respond to it. I would like to repeat my question, which is to the Government of Canada. Why do I say that?
It is the entirety of the Government of Canada that issued the budget which took a blow to Canada's environment. While we would expect a lot of resources in the budget to go to the Minister of the Environment, and I would love to see much more resources go to the minister and his department, in fact, the vast majority of any resources that could potentially be used for environmentally munificent purposes, such as furthering what the government calls its clean energy strategy, would go to the Minister of the Environment because he and his officials would know best where we can find the savings in reducing harmful gases and pollutants, and where best those savings could be deployed.
In its wisdom, the government has decided to give that entire basket of resources to the Minister of Natural Resources. Regrettably, in this budget, it did not shortchange the Minister of Natural Resources.
The reason I put the question to the Government of Canada is because, in its wisdom, in the throne speech it said that nowhere is the commitment to principled policy, backed by action, needed more than addressing climate change. Then it moved to table a budget that did exactly the opposite.
The government chose to kill, at the end of this year, an extremely popular program for homeowners to energy retrofit their homes, which is incredibly oversubscribed.
Did the government choose to put any money into a program to retrofit small businesses? No. In fact, in my riding small businesses are crying for support and we are trying to organize them so they can do it cost effectively.
Did the government, as per its U.S.-Canada clean energy dialogue, agree to follow, and it repeatedly said it was following the lead of Obama by working in sync, President Obama's lead and agree, over two years, to retrofit 75% of federally owned buildings? No. I discovered in a search that it has moved on retrofitting approximately 6 out of over 20,000 buildings.
Where is the principled policy, backed by action, to address climate change in the government's policies or in its budget? It cannot be found.
Then the government moved to actually claw back the environmental regulation that is there that might call into question projects coming forward that could be further curtailing or mitigating the environmental impacts. No. In its wisdom it decides it is going to take that power away from the very agency established by previous governments, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency, and assign, transfer that power to the National Energy Board and the nuclear agency, both agencies well known for touting fossil fuels and nuclear power, respectively.
In the budget, we see not a dollar pledged for foreign aid on climate change. This is puzzling since the minister, even today, before our committee, asked why the other parties were not stepping up and commending him for signing the Copenhagen accord? What does that Copenhagen accord do? It compels the government to commit specified dollars for foreign aid. Well, if the government is following President Obama, who has already committed $1 billion, where is the estimated over $400 million that the government has committed?
So, my question remains: where is the action, where are the dollars for a green economy for Canadians?