Mr. Speaker, our government has a climate plan. We have worked very hard on this climate plan, and now we are implementing it. Unfortunately, we have the party opposite working with Conservative parties across the country, politicians who actually do not understand there is a cost of climate change right now, that we are paying the price and that the bigger price will be paid by our kids. They also do not understand the economic opportunity. They have no plan for the environment. They have no plan for the economy.
We need to come together as a country. We need to make climate change a non-partisan issue. If we make it a partisan issue, we will never do what we need to do, which is to actually be serious about climate action. At the end of the day, we have one planet, so we need to figure out how we are going to save that planet. We need to figure out how we are going to ensure that our kids are not going to face the things that were mentioned in that report, things like acute food shortages, devastating storms, climate refugees, a melting Arctic which has consequences for the entire world. It would mean no more coral reefs and species at risk we all love across our country would disappear. Is that what we want? No.
We all care greatly about our country. We all care greatly about the animals in our country. We care greatly about snow, and it does not matter whether we are snowmobilers, skiers or kids who want to go tobogganing. We need to be serious about climate action, and we have an opportunity to do it, to do it right, and also to create good jobs and grow our economy.
I ask all parties to join us, to be serious about climate change, and help us take the action we have worked so hard to set out in our climate plan and are implementing with Canadians. We are implementing it with cities, businesses, hospitals, schools and kids. We are going to continue working really hard with Canadians. I just wish the Conservative Party would work with us.
Brian Mulroney was the first person to talk about putting a price on pollution. He tackled one of the biggest problems we had when I was growing up: acid rain. I was worried and petrified as a kid about acid rain. How did he do it? He did it through political leadership, through innovation, by working with business and putting a price on pollution. I ask that we work together, that we take these smart measures, that we come together as a country and that we show we can be a natural resource based country and we can still take climate action. We are a natural resource based country. We want to get our resources to market, but we need to do it in a sustainable way.
We have the opportunity to provide the solutions that the world desperately needs. These are solutions that are creating good jobs, that are going to take advantage of the economic opportunity and that we can export to other countries that are also trying to figure out how to take climate action. China is looking for Canadian solutions. When I go to China, I go with companies from Canada. I go with carbon capture and storage from Saskatchewan. I do not discriminate against any good solutions. We do not have the luxury of saying that we are not going to work with people. It is why our government continues every day in every city and town across this country to work with farmers, businesses and environmentalists. We continue working with them because we do not have a choice, and we have this opportunity.
Once again, it is up to us. It is up to people in this House to be serious about climate action, and to figure out how we are going to come together and take serious action. After a decade of inaction and not taking seriously what we knew from scientists about needing to act on climate change, we need to come together now. We can do this. I am an optimist, a realistic optimist.
I have seen Canadians across the country want to be with us. Hospitals that are saving money through investments we have made in retrofits are investing that money in their patients. Schools that are investing in energy efficiency are reinvesting that money in their students. Businesses that are investing in being more energy efficient can reinvest that money in their businesses and employees. We can do this. We can, but we have to be serious and we have to come together.
We need to acknowledge that climate change is real and serious, that we are seeing the impacts, that there is a cost to it right now and that we can act. We can do right by our planet to reduce our emissions and create good jobs, and we can create made-in-Canada solutions that we can export to the world.
I know we can do this, but I also know we need to come together. We owe it to Canadians. We owe it to our kids. We owe it to the world. We have one shot right now to take serious action on climate change, and we should just get to work, come together and show Canadians how it is done.