David Anderson

[Climate Change Plan, November 21st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2) I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the Government of Canada's “Climate Change Plan for Canada”.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 20th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the level of questioning would improve if the hon. Leader of the Opposition and his friends would let them be phrased on this side of the House.

That aside, the problem that he outlined is exactly in that weasel word he used, unduly. What does unduly mean? A weasel word. If he would explain that to the satisfaction of the provinces, the territories and the federal government, perhaps we would be further ahead as to what we could accept.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 20th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the first mistake the hon. Leader of the Opposition made in his presentation and his preamble was to describe the plan for implementing and achieving the Canadian decision of minus 6% of 1990 levels as not being a made in Canada plan.

Let me assure him that it is the result of five full years of discussion with the provinces and territories, with industry, with environmental groups and, shortly, it will have the benefit of a few hours and days of debate in the House. Therefore, it is very much a made in Canada plan.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 20th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. Leader of the Opposition has answered his own question. He talks about lack of approval of the provinces. We do not know whether there will or will not be such approval. Therefore, he has already put a condition in which is exactly the type of thing that we would like to clarify before we go in and have an agreement with them on these other points that are in dispute.

[Wind Energy, November 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his excellent question.

The discussion on what will be in the Government of Canada's budget next February or March will be between the Minister of Finance and his colleagues between now and February. The hon. member's ideas will no doubt be taken into consideration.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 18th, 2002]

Once again, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has mischaracterized the standard practice for treaty ratification.

I can assure him that we will follow the standard practice for treaty ratification. I can assure him also that I know of no country on earth which has done more to try to anticipate the cost to the economy, the cost to any sector of the economy and the cost to any region of the country of ratification of Kyoto than Canada.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member's inexperience perhaps has led him to not understand exactly what takes place in the case ratification. He has wildly exaggerated the work that is done prior to ratification.

I can assure him that we fully intend to have details and give a very good picture of what the costs will be and what the impact will be for every sector of the economy and for every part of the country before ratification takes place.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has not accurately described some of the 12 principles upon which we have differing views. For example, regarding the words “incorporate appropriate federally funded mitigation of the adverse impacts of climate change initiatives”, we are not quite sure exactly how far that goes and whether that includes the federal government paying for every climate change initiative or not.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the very day that these 12 principles were put forward I indicated that 9 were acceptable but that 3 were ambiguous or were capable of more than one meaning. We have asked for clarification on those. We are awaiting that clarification. I certainly hope we will get it and I certainly hope the meeting will take place on Thursday.

[Kyoto Protocol, November 18th, 2002]

Yes, Mr. Speaker.