Debates of Dec. 3rd, 2024

Environment and Sustainable Development

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will have the opportunity to delve into the points my colleague raised concerning my party and, of course, green energy. I think that she will be very happy to hear that.

I would like to mention that the member was elected nine years ago, at the same time as me. She has announced that she will not be running for re-election. I would like to thank her for her work and for representing her constituents so effectively for the past nine years. Maybe she will go back to her union roots. Maybe we will have a chance to see each other again. I would like to commend this colleague for her co-operative spirit and hard work. She was voted the most collegial MP five or six years ago, if I remember correctly.

Anyway, we are here to do a job as MPs. She mentioned recommendation 16 regarding federal-provincial collaboration. Having sat in the House for nine years and seen what the government is doing, does she still trust the federal Liberal government to coordinate and collaborate with the provinces, or would she say that this government has in fact constantly interfered in the provinces' jurisdictions over the past nine years?

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have to say that the Liberal government has struggled with respect for jurisdiction, even though, not that long ago, at the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, the Minister of Environment again saw fit to lecture me about respecting jurisdiction. That is not okay. I was talking about greenhouse gases. The federal government is responsible for pipes and pipelines. It is also responsible for offshore development. When the federal government allows offshore drilling, that is within its jurisdiction. I am happy to provide that little primer on how the Constitution works. The idea is to ensure due regard for our jurisdiction.

That is why people eventually come to the realization that, if we had our own country, maybe we could handle our own affairs.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, I, too, enjoy sitting on the environment committee with the hon. member. She is going to be dearly missed in the House.

She raised the point of the environment minister lecturing her about jurisdiction. It was in the context of Bay du Nord. The government has approved not only the Trans Mountain pipeline, which is going to cost taxpayers $35 billion, threaten our west coast and increase emissions around the globe, but also Bay du Nord.

Can the member speak about the hypocrisy, the contradictions, in an environment minister, and a government, that claims to be a climate leader but then approves these kinds of projects and buys a pipeline?

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madam Speaker, let us take another look at what happened at the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development last week.

The federal government is responsible for pipes. It is responsible for pipelines and offshore drilling, while the provinces are responsible for natural resources. In other words, the government has decided to drill in restricted areas where there should be no drilling because they are the responsibility of Quebec and the provinces.

That, to me, is an ungovernable country.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Madam Speaker, I too want to take a few seconds as well to salute my colleague from Repentigny who, unfortunately, will not be with us for the next election. In our caucus, we affectionately call her our eco-warrior, or Momo, which is shorter and simpler. I salute her because she is an inspiration to many colleagues.

Today, we are talking about support for clean technologies. An article published in this morning's newspapers states that partisan politics is basically the biggest obstacle to our decarbonization efforts. As it happens, that answer came from someone I admire a lot, Normand Mousseau, the scientific director of the Institut de l'énergie Trottier. He gave that answer to my colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent, who asked him why Canada's decarbonization performance has been so disappointing. I will read Mr. Mousseau's statement, because it is worth noting.

There's a consistency problem at the federal level, because it's very hard to move projects forward with parties that are so far apart on the very objective of [decarbonization]....

That is part of why there is such a big problem. Why is Canada, in particular, having so much trouble holding its own when it comes to clean technologies? It is because different parties are taking completely different positions. Business people are reluctant to invest in major projects if there is no predictability.

The signal that the Leader of the Opposition regularly sends is that he does not believe in global warming. Most of the Conservatives' opposition days have been devoted to eliminating the carbon tax, which is probably one of the key tools for transitioning to clean energy, so the only possible conclusion we can draw is that he does not believe in global warming.

Just last week, when we had the emergency debate on U.S. tariffs, the Leader of the Opposition repeated that he believes Canada needs more oil and gas pipelines and needs to export more energy. If I were a clean energy investor, knowing full well that the next government will probably be Conservative, I do not think I would be willing to invest much of my money in clean energy projects. That is what Professor Mousseau was saying this morning. I do not think that Professor Mousseau is particularly partisan. He is the scientific director of the Institut de l'énergie Trottier, a top expert on energy matters. This is the typical dynamic when the federal government is dealing with the energy file. Why are opinions so polarized? It is because Canada is under the thumb of the oil and gas industry.

As proof, consider the Trans Mountain fiasco. Let me make an evocative comparison. The Parliamentary Budget Officer told the Standing Committee on Natural Resources that we put $4.6 billion into Trans Mountain that we will never get back. The government will never get that money back. It threw $4.6 billion out the window, and the project itself cost $34 billion.

Let me remind members that the federal government announced in 2023 that its ambitious plan to electrify and decarbonize the Canadian economy would cost $40 billion, yet a single fossil fuel project cost $34 billion. The most ambitious plan in the history of government, according to our Liberal colleagues, was going to cost $40 billion. That is just awful. This comparison shows how awful it is.

Why should anyone consider investing in clean technologies when the federal government is basically saying that, if we want the pipeline to be profitable, we will have to be slaves to oil for the next 40 years? Not only that, but if we want the pipeline to be profitable, we need to pick up the pace and produce even more barrels of oil. According to the figures provided by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, that is totally inconsistent. According to the IPCC, if we want to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, we need to reduce our oil consumption by 62%. Moreover, if we do not have a carbon capture and sequestration strategy, which is a mere pipe dream, as I will demonstrate later, we will have to reduce our fossil fuel consumption by 70%. That is if we want to stick to a 1.5-degree-Celsius increase in global temperatures.

What we are doing, however, is investing $34 billion in infrastructure so as to maximize oil consumption. If that is not inconsistent, then I honestly do not know what is.

I will get back to this insanity now. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, if we want to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, we have to reduce our oil consumption by 62%, and that is with with carbon capture and sequestration strategies. Speaking of this carbon capture and sequestration nonsense, not too long ago Suncor CEO Rich Kruger came out and said, “We have a bit of a disproportionate emphasis on the longer-term energy transition”.

Suncor's Rich Kruger wondered why so much energy had to be dedicated to these new technologies. He said that the focus should instead be on the commercial interest, the oil sands. We do not have to agree with him, but at least he was being frank. This is indicative of what we see in the oil and gas sector.

Oil companies know full well that carbon capture and sequestration strategies cost a fortune and that the pipe dream of producing net-zero oil makes about as much sense as making diet poutine. It will never happen.

[An hon. member]

Oh, oh!

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Madam Speaker, I got a Liberal member to react by talking about poutine. That is good.

Business people are no dummies. What these big oil companies are saying is that Ottawa should be assuming the risks. If we want low-carbon oil, it will not be the greedy oil and gas sector that will take on the risks, it will be the federal government. Taxpayers are the ones who will have to assume the risks on behalf of the oil companies, which have been raking in record profits since the end of the pandemic. It that is not indecent, I do not know what is.

What we know about carbon capture and sequestration strategies is that their effectiveness remains unproven. However, there is a consortium of corporations known as the Pathways Alliance. Many have probably heard of it already. It is a consortium comprising all the big oil companies. In fact, in a moment of rare lucidity the Leader of the Opposition said that these people were harmful and served no purpose. For once, I had to agree with the leader of the official opposition. I hope he keeps repeating that message.

The Pathways Alliance is an oil consortium that was investigated by the Competition Bureau for false advertising. It even had to remove from its website statements claiming that it was able to make the oil sands carbon neutral. The Pathways Alliance, whose greenwashing practices were revealed in 2024 and which was forced to remove false statements from its website, wants almost $16 billion in funding from the federal government for carbon capture and sequestration projects.

The government would bear the costs. The Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and the Minister of Finance announced their intention to reach an agreement with the consortium by 2024 through the Canada growth fund, or CGF. The CGF falls outside Ottawa's accounting purview. We have no control over it. The Parliamentary Budget Officer and the Auditor General can do nothing. In addition to the CGF, the government would use tax credits available only to oil-producing provinces to achieve its goals.

In my opinion, this amounts to throwing public funds out the window. There are, however, interesting critical minerals initiatives. I am thinking in particular about phosphate. The government agreed to put phosphate on the list of critical minerals, but without the associated tax credits. What is the point? I will not even mention hydrogen. The federal government was forced to lower its projections on hydrogen by 80%.

I am ready to answer my colleagues' questions. I will end my speech by saying, “turlututu, chapeau pointu”, what absolute nonsense.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to listen to my colleague, who often shows up at the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development and makes a great contribution to the committee.

I would like to address the Conservatives' discourse on climate change. Everything appears to revolve around a single solution, namely, spending government money to develop green technologies. That is a one-dimensional strategy that would break the federal budget.

Does the member agree that we need a portfolio of measures, including carbon pricing and investments in natural spaces that would absorb greenhouse gases? Does he really think it is wise to put all our eggs in one basket?

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Madam Speaker, I do not think that the Conservatives will put all their eggs in one basket. I think that they are simply going to do away with any and all measures intended to support the implementation of clean energies.

As I see it, Conservatives are Liberals with very few scruples. They know full well that oil pollutes, but are they prepared to put measures such as emissions caps in place?

They will simply do away with emissions caps. Companies with clean energy projects will find themselves defunded. That is the concern of many stakeholders in the energy sector and, in my opinion, they are right to be concerned.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am not without scruples, but above all I am certainly no Liberal. I know my colleague was joking when he said it, but I will remember Momo and “turlututu”.

I agree with one thing the member brought up. Yesterday, in fact, in parliamentary committee, I did not necessarily make a big deal of it, but I did jump on the fact that this Liberal government, which loves to lecture everyone, spent nearly $40 billion of taxpayers money on a pipeline project that was private, and not even for sale. The government bought it, built it and it cost six times more than expected. Only the Liberals could get something that wrong.

I would remind the member, however, that he is in a region where a lot of people get around by truck, pick-up or snowmobile. The season is about to start, if I am not mistaken. I think that the Monts-Valin mountains are in his riding. A lot of people will be driving around there on snowmobiles and chances are they will need to use fuel.

What does he have to say to these millions of Quebeckers who, according to the latest figures, have used nearly 19 billion litres of oil? There has been a 7% increase in oil consumption in Quebec. What do we tell these people? Do we tell them they have to buy their oil abroad or can we be self-sufficient here in Canada?

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Madam Speaker, I come right out and tell these people to be patient, because transportation electrification is making rapid progress. I am seeing more and more electric F-150 trucks in my region. The best part is that when we plug in our EVs at home, our money does not go to Alberta but to Hydro‑Québec. That will, in turn, enable us to develop these upcoming technologies.

What I tell these people is that they should ask for more and more electric transportation options. When they buy these vehicles, they will come out the winners. The people in my region seem to be listening, because I am seeing more and more electric vehicles. This is beneficial for Quebec. What surprises me is to see a member from Quebec defending Alberta's interests instead of those of his own province.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, the member mentioned that he believes, and I think most Canadians believe, the Conservatives would scrap investments in climate solutions. We also know they would cut essential bodies that keep us on track and would muzzle scientists. In 2012, the Harper government cut funding to the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy. It meant we had no way to track the impacts of forest fires and climate devastation.

Can the member speak to how scary it is to think about another government that would crack down on scientists, that would muzzle the essential voices we need when we are facing a climate emergency, especially given nine years of Liberal inaction?

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Madam Speaker, I tend to agree with my colleague. The Leader of the Opposition already does not allow his members to speak freely, so I am sure that he will try to apply the same logic to scientists in Canada who do not agree with his political aspirations.

These are dark days for the planet, but it will be smooth sailing for the oil sector in the years ahead.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for New Westminster—Burnaby.

When I speak to young people in my riding, they ask me a heartbreaking question: “Why are elected leaders not doing more?” These are kids who are growing up seeing the devastating impacts of the climate emergency: each summer, more intense wildfires; people choking on smoke; the rising costs from climate devastation; and hundreds of lives lost in heat domes. They are looking to the House and to every member here and asking us, “Please, do not steal our futures.”

We are facing a climate emergency. Every scientific report underscores this truth and we have a rapidly closing window to act. Unfortunately, what we have seen from the Liberal government, and the Conservative government before it, are missed targets, empty promises and actions that prioritize the profits of rich CEOs of wealthy oil and gas companies over the survival of our planet.

I want to talk a bit about the Conservatives because they cannot even agree if climate change is real. They claim to care about affordability while denying the climate crisis itself. While they oppose measures to reduce emissions, they also oppose affordability measures. They continue to vote against ensuring low- and middle-income families could access heat pumps to bring down their energy bills, against GST breaks. They also offer no credible plan to address the rising costs of climate disasters. Hurricanes, floods and droughts are not abstract threats or things that are going to happen sometime in the future. They are happening here and now and are impacting communities from coast to coast to coast. Conservative denial and inaction leaves Canadians to pay the price, both in dollars and in lives.

The Liberals seem to want to be Conservative lite. They acknowledge the climate crisis is real, but their actions fall woefully short of what is needed to address the climate crisis. They say they are climate leaders, but Canada is ranked 62 out of 67 on the climate change performance index. I will let that sink in: 62 out of 67. We are in the bottom tier. The environment minister keeps saying it is okay because we are on track to meet our 2030 targets, but his own watchdog, the environment commissioner, has come to committee and said time and time again and has made it very clear that we are not on track.

The government is not on track. It continues to prop up oil and gas companies with billions of dollars in subsidies. These are the same companies that are raking in record profits even as the UN Secretary-General calls fossil fuel expansion “moral and economic madness.” How can the Liberals justify the billions of dollars they continue to hand to big oil and gas companies in public financing for fossil fuels while they claim to fight for a net-zero future?

The commissioner of the environment's reports also have laid bare the consequences of Liberal mismanagement. The net-zero accelerator initiative the Liberals have touted as a key pillar of Canada's climate strategy is a cautionary tale of inefficiency. Only two of the 55 largest industrial emitters in Canada have committed to the goals. The average cost to taxpayers for each ton of emissions reduced by the net-zero accelerator is as high as $523. This is not the pathway to a climate-safe future. Critical accountability mechanisms need to be involved in every climate solution we put forward. Unfortunately, the government continues to show it is not a climate leader. This is failure by design.

Young people and workers across the country deserve better. They are demanding action. They are demanding justice. That starts with listening to the communities that are bearing the brunt of the climate crisis. Indigenous nations, low-income families and rural Canadians feel abandoned by Ottawa. These communities are not just victims of the climate crisis. They are also leaders in the solutions that we need. Renewable energy projects, conservation initiatives, sustainable agriculture, and indigenous and local knowledge must be at the heart of our climate response.

What should we be doing? The solutions are clear. They are within our grasp. Let us stop handing out billions of dollars in subsidies to the oil and gas companies that are fuelling the climate crisis. Let us redirect those funds into workers and into the clean economy. Let us implement an excess profits tax and invest that money in retrofitting homes, bringing down home heating costs, expanding public transit and creating good, family-sustaining jobs in the low-carbon economy. This will make life more affordable and curb the pollution that is driving up emissions.

I want to take a moment to speak directly to the young people who are worried about the climate and to the workers who are fighting to build a better future. We see them, we hear them and we will not stop fighting for bold, urgent action that matches the scale of this crisis. This moment calls for courage. It calls for leaders who will stop pretending they are on track, stop listening to oil and gas CEOs, and start listening to Canadians, to science and to their own environment commissioner. It calls for policies that put people over profits, that confront the greed of fossil fuel executives, and that deliver the justice and hope Canadians deserve.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and to the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources]

Madam Speaker, I listened with a lot of interest to the speech. I agree that climate change is one of the biggest fights for our country and our world. It is a matter of our next generations and the future of our planet. It is also about our economic future. Economists from across our country are saying that carbon pricing is the single most efficient way for us to fight climate change in our country, and it is helping to reduce our emissions as we speak, because they are now the lowest they have been in three decades.

Can the member opposite explain why the NDP has chosen not to support carbon pricing?

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is unfortunate that the Liberals continue to want to spread misinformation. We expect that from the Conservatives, but it is always disappointing that every time I raise ending fossil fuel subsidies, implementing an excess profits tax or investing in climate solutions, the answer from the Liberal government is, what about the carbon tax? We support carbon pricing and we want industrial emitters to pay more.

For some reason, the Liberals think their carbon pricing scheme is the be-all and end-all of climate policy. Guess what? Consumer carbon pricing is 8% to 14%, and industrial carbon pricing makes up about 40% of our emissions reduction plan. That is huge. We need to bolster the industrial carbon price. It is unfortunate that the Liberals seem to think consumer carbon pricing is a silver bullet.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Madam Speaker, when it comes to the net-zero accelerator fund, the environment commissioner, in their report, was actually quite clear on the shady nature of what the Liberals are up to. The target for the fund is not public. The formula they are using to measure the success of the fund is not public. They are not letting the public know what they are up to when it comes to this fund, yet they spent $8 billion on the net-zero accelerator fund without the public knowing the intended goal of it.

Does the member believe that the Liberals should be accountable? If they are going to set targets, they should let the public know what the goal is and how they are going to achieve those emissions reductions.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is so disappointing to me that policies that could benefit Canadians and drive down our emissions are designed so poorly by the Liberal government that now we have Conservatives up in arms. Really, the Liberals are giving Conservatives ammunition to attack climate policy. We need strong, robust climate policy in Canada that drives down our emissions and creates good, sustainable jobs in every community across our country. Unfortunately, the Liberal government continues to fail by design.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like my colleague to comment on recommendation 14. Of course, I will read it. I do not want her to have to guess as to what I am talking about.

That the Government of Canada conduct a gap analysis of the incentives in place for clean technology in Canada and the United States, to study differences and understand policy gaps within the specific regional and national context to inform future policy decisions.

The recent election of Donald Trump puts us in a particularly interesting situation. Canada needs to take a strong position. Instead of reacting to Donald Trump's threats, Canada should promote its clean energy. Exporting electricity comes to mind. Producing strategic critical minerals that the Americans will need is another example that comes to mind. We also have the softwood lumber crisis and need to consider all the biomass that can be produced as a result. In short, Canadian energy policies need to be promoted in the U.S., since they could really make a difference in the North American context.

Could my colleague comment on that? How can we promote our Canadian economy given that someone like Donald Trump was elected president?

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, this is an important question right now. We saw that, under Biden, we had the Inflation Reduction Act, something bold, something that really highlighted how ineffective Canada's climate policies have been and how we really need to step up. However, now, we are facing a whole new context where a Trump presidency means probably the undermining of climate policy in the United States and potentially around the world. It is even more important right now for Canada to put forward bold climate solutions and to steer away from those climate solutions we know are unproven, risky and expensive, things like carbon capture and storage, which this government continues to funnel billions of taxpayer money into. Profitable oil and gas companies could be funding that themselves.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to follow my colleague from Victoria. She has a very powerful voice when it comes to climate change and Canada's role in addressing that reality.

I could not agree with her more about how the Conservatives are denying the very existence of climate change. I will come back to that in a few moments.

When the Conservatives were in office, they simply denied the existence of climate change, which was irresponsible. As we will see later on, the result is that people have died and communities have disappeared because of the Conservatives' irresponsibility. Then, the Liberals took office. They are well aware that climate change exists, but they have done little or nothing to combat it. The whole climate change file has been a disaster for the past 20 years.

However, there has been no shortage of resources. The Harper government and the current government provided a combined $1 trillion to boost the cash flow of Canada's big banks in order to sweeten their profits, executive bonuses and dividends. Together, both governments doled out $1 trillion. They also let a total $500 billion go to tax havens. The Conservatives set that up and the Liberals kept it going.

As my colleague just said, the two governments combined have paid out a total of $100 billion in subsidies to oil company executives. The Liberals, in a panic, set up a form of funding to finance Trans Mountain when the private sector refused to have anything to do with it. That cost us $35 billion. It took 24 hours for the Liberals to decide to invest $35 billion in a pipeline construction project that would never turn a profit, as we know all too well. The Parliamentary Budget Officer clearly said that it would never make a profit. Moreover, the environmental impacts are well known.

For the past 20 years, neither party has taken the environment and climate change seriously, and there is no doubt we are now seeing the result of that. Their policies have had real consequences. In a moment, I will talk about the repercussions in my province, British Columbia, but we have seen repercussions across Canada. Forestry communities are in crisis. There have been record-breaking numbers of forest fires. There have been floods across the country. There have been intense heat waves. There have been all kinds of weather-related crises, many of which catch people off guard. The Conservatives deny that it is real. The Liberals say it is real, but they do not want to do anything about it.

What is the reality when we see 20 years of complete inaction on the environment and climate change, yet there are massive subsidies for other things? Between the Liberals and the Conservatives together, $1 trillion was given in liquidity supports to Canada's big banks, half a trillion dollars was given to overseas tax savings, and $100 billion was given to oil and gas CEOs to subsidize what are massive profits to begin with. Of course, the Liberals are aware of this. There was $35 billion given, with a 24-hour turnaround, when they realized the private sector was bowing out of Trans Mountain.

That is the reality of what we have seen over the last 20 years. That is why so many people are saying it is time to push aside the Liberals and the Conservatives and elect a government that actually understands the importance of taking action on climate change and the opportunity that comes from this.

The reality is that the Joe Biden administration in the United States has put in place infrastructure that we have seen for clean energy across the U.S. Those investments have made a huge difference. A number of American cities and states are asking for clean energy, and if Canada actually stepped up, the market and the job creation coming from that would be enormous.

We have not seen that imagination and foresight from either Conservatives, who are climate change deniers, or the Liberal government, which pays lip service to climate change. It does nothing to actually put in place the infrastructure that would lead to those substantial investments and the kinds of clean energy jobs of tomorrow that we want to see. We know what the opposite impacts are. Canada could lead the world in clean energy investments. We have virtually unlimited ability and capacity, when we talk about climate change and combatting it with clean energy investments in wind, solar and tidal, as well as unlimited potential for clean energy production. However, the Liberals have not stepped forward to put in place the infrastructure or to make those investments.

We have seen the opposite impacts, and my colleague from Victoria spoke very eloquently about this. When the heat dome hit in my region of British Columbia, when it descended on the Lower Mainland, what happened was an incredible overloading of our emergency services. Firefighters and ambulance paramedics will tell us about how they simply were not able to keep up with the emergency demands over those days. Therefore, people slowly succumbed in low-level apartments that did not have air conditioning and that were not equipped for the size and scope of the heat dome.

Emergency services were so overwhelmed that the system was at the point of breaking. Fortunately, this time, the heat dome finally broke. The result was that over 600 residents of the Lower Mainland died in that tragedy. In my riding of New Westminster—Burnaby, seniors, people with disabilities and shut-ins died quietly because of the intense heat. This happened particularly on the west side of New Westminster, where there are a lot of older low-rise apartments with no access to air conditioning. Dozens died in my riding. Hundreds died across the Lower Mainland.

Members will recall as well that we have seen a number of communities. I spoke about forest fires and the impacts. We have seen entire communities simply disappear in North America because of the climate crisis. We are seeing record levels of flooding, and in British Columbia, just in the last few years, we have had two atmospheric rivers and such torrential rains that we have been cut off from the rest of Canada. These tragedies are all preventable if we take action to combat climate change.

Younger Canadians see the impacts and see successive governments, Conservative and Liberal, that do little to nothing to actually combat the climate crisis, to prepare us for what is to come, to mitigate the impacts of climate change or to ensure that Canada and communities are protected. Seniors, shut-ins and people with disabilities are in apartments that are not built for the profound impacts of climate change. We must put in place measures so that, when a heat dome comes again, they can actually survive such a tremendous, terrible impact. It is a question of when, not if.

We have had successive governments, both Conservative and Liberal, that have done nothing as we have become more and more aware of climate change. What members are hearing from the New Democrats today is that New Democrats believe in making those investments, combatting climate change and fighting that fight as if we intend to win it.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, Mark Jaccard, Canada's leading resource economist, evaluated the 2021 election platforms. According to a CBC article, he found, “The Liberals have the most effective, least costly climate change policy of the...federal parties”. The NDP was not even second. The Conservatives were second because they promised a price on carbon. In 2019, Professor Jaccard said, “In climate policy, experts agree that Canada is finally a global leader. I wonder if enough climate-concerned Canadians will recognize this, before it is too late.”

Why do the hon. member and his party not recognize this reality?

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is true that, on paper, Liberals have great plans. For 30 years, they planned to put pharmacare in place. For decades, in every election, they promised to put dental care in place. They always have great plans at election time; once the election is over, they simply tear up their platform. Their platform was very good, but they never implemented it. That is the problem; that is the difference. That is the hypocrisy of the Liberal government: They simply do not put it in place.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Madam Speaker, at least the Liberals arguably recognize climate change. Conservatives are heckling over there, but Conservatives have no lessons to give to anybody, because they do not even believe in the reality of climate change. I would suggest that Conservative MPs actually talk to their constituents, particularly younger constituents, because they certainly understand the impacts of climate change. They want to see action. They do not want to see the “ostrich stuck in the sand” attitude of the Conservative Party of Canada.