House of Commons photoLost her last election, in 2019, with 36% of the vote.
Natural Resources May 10th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, our government has initiated formal financial discussions with Kinder Morgan, the result of which will be to remove uncertainty overhanging the project. We are confident in our jurisdiction in this matter. We are also actively pursuing legislative options that will assert and reinforce the federal jurisdiction in this matter, which we know we clearly have.
Hundreds of thousands of hard-working Canadians depend on this project being built.
The Environment May 9th, 2018
Madam Speaker, carbon pricing, as we know, is the key to any credible climate plan because it is a cost-effective way to significantly reduce pollution while driving clean innovation and creating new jobs. A price on carbon creates a powerful incentive to cut pollution. It encourages people and businesses to save money by making cleaner choices like better insulating their homes or upgrading to more efficient equipment.
Carbon pricing is a foundation of Canada's clean growth and climate action plan. Four out of five Canadians live in jurisdictions that are already pricing carbon pollution today. By ensuring all parts of Canada price pollution at the same standard, we will help ensure we drive down our emissions and grow our economy.
The Environment May 9th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, Canadians know polluting is not free. Severe weather due to climate change is already costing Canadians billions of dollars a year in insurance costs. Across the country, Canadians have experienced first-hand devastating wildfires, extreme flooding, severe droughts, and stronger storms.
Canadians overwhelmingly support action on climate change and a growing economy. We know pricing pollution works. It is a low-cost solution that fights climate change, encourages innovation, keeps our economy strong, and creates good middle-class jobs.
According to the World Bank, nearly half the world's economy is pricing pollution today, including China, California, and the EU. Canada's five major banks, along with many companies in the consumer goods, energy, and resources development sectors also support putting a price on pollution.
A price on carbon pollution gives households and businesses a powerful incentive to save money by making choices like turning down the thermostat and taking transit, or investing in clean solutions like more efficient appliances and vehicles.
We have released an analysis that shows that putting a price on pollution across Canada will significantly reduce carbon pollution while maintaining a strong and growing economy. Our analysis found that a price on carbon across Canada could reduce greenhouse gas emissions by up to 90 million tonnes in 2022. This is as much as taking 23 million to 26 million cars off the road or shutting down 20 to 23 coal-fired power plants for a year. It also shows that carbon pricing reduces pollution without hurting Canada's GDP.
National GDP is estimated to grow by about 2% a year between now and 2022, with or without carbon pricing. This does not include the huge opportunity that clean innovation spurred by carbon pricing will have in helping Canadian companies create jobs and compete successfully in the global shift to cleaner growth, an opportunity the World Bank estimates will be worth $23 trillion globally between now and 2030.
Real world experience backs that up. Last year, the four provinces with a price on pollution, B.C., Alberta, Quebec, and Ontario, led the country in economic growth. Putting a price on pollution will make Canada's economy stronger over time, help create new economic opportunities, and good middle-class jobs.
Business of Supply May 8th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, competitiveness is one of the issues that our price on carbon would address. As I mentioned in my remarks, there are over 46 countries and over 26 subnational governments that have put a price on carbon pollution. As Canada, we are seen as the leader, and we want to be the leader. We certainly do not want to be the laggard.
I would also remind the member opposite that the revenue that comes from the price on carbon goes back to the provinces and territories, where they can choose to do what they wish with it, whether it is lowering taxes for citizens, giving companies additional money to help innovate and reduce taxes, or building hospitals and schools. Provinces do different things with the money as they see fit, but all of those revenues are going back to the provinces and territories.
Business of Supply May 8th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, I am glad the hon. member brought up what happened a few years ago when emissions went down. It amazes me that the member opposite and his party are trying to take credit for something that happened in Ontario with the phase-out of coal-fired plants. Nuclear power represents over 60% of the electricity generation in Ontario.
The elimination of the coal-fired plants has seen a reduction of visits of children with asthma at Ontario hospitals. It has seen respiratory problems go down. There are a number of benefits to the path that we are on and none to the path that the member opposite is suggesting.
Business of Supply May 8th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, I agree with my colleague that we should have started a long time ago, but we did not. We were not in government a long time ago. In 10 years of government, the former government chose not to do anything about not just pricing carbon but about our commitments to climate change.
The member asked what other things we can do or are doing. One is the elimination of coal. As we know, it is one of the elements of our energy system that produces significant emissions and one of the things that we have committed as a government to phase out. It is part of the pan-Canadian framework on clean growth and climate change and is a significant way to address our clean energy.
Business of Supply May 8th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Carleton for his motion. Unfortunately, this motion is another example of never missing an opportunity to miss an opportunity.
After years of denying climate change, after years of being singled out for fossil fuel awards at international climate meetings, after years of feet-dragging, one would hope that perhaps, just perhaps, a light would shine through to inform motions like this.
Sadly, that appears not to be the case. Rather than embrace, as so much of the world has done, that climate change is real and that action is needed, this motion reflects the same old tune, the tune of denial, division, and opposing any action that would treat climate change as the challenge it is.
Actually, it is not so much about singing the same old tune as it is about whistling past the same old graveyard. It reflects the perspective that if we just whistle loudly enough and close our eyes tightly enough, climate change will simply go away and the world will revert back to the way things used to be before climate change became a scientifically established fact, before the world came together in Paris, and before the impacts of climate change became obvious to anyone with the wit and the will to see them.
That is what this motion represents, a long-past nostalgic time when sea levels were not rising, when more extreme weather was not happening, when greenhouse gas emissions were not a concern. It is a lovely place, but it is not planet Earth.
In reality, climate change is having profound effects on our world, and countries are alive to both the challenges and the opportunities it presents. This is perhaps where the motion most misses the point, in realizing that we are now in the clean growth century and that those nations that provide the innovation, ideas, and ingenuity to address climate change will be the ones that prosper.
The transition to clean energy is a perfect case in point. As the world embraces renewable energy and cleaner ways to extract traditional energy, Canada is ideally positioned to provide those answers.
Our clean technology sector ranks fourth in the world, and first in the G20. That is according to the 2017 Cleantech Innovation Index. Canada has now leapfrogged ahead of the United States, Israel, and the United Kingdom. That is a jump from seventh in 2014. Canada also ranks third in the general drivers index, a set of indicators related to starting a business, clean tech or otherwise.
My friend will also be proud that the authors of the 2017 Cleantech Innovation Index praise Canada for its “leadership in national regulatory quality and government effectiveness, signaling the ability of [its government] to formulate and implement policies that promote the development of the private sector.”
That is what happens when a government makes generational investments in clean technology and clean infrastructure. It is what happens when a government takes climate change seriously by signing the Paris accord; accelerating the phase-out of coal; creating a low-carbon fuel standard; regulating methane emissions; making unprecedented investments in foundational science; developing, together with our provincial and territorial colleagues, a national plan for combatting climate change; and, yes, putting a price on carbon, as 42 countries and 25 subnational jurisdictions have also done.
As is clear from this motion, the hon. member does not want Canada to be part of this global shift. He does not want to tax carbon, presumably because he does not believe that carbon is contributing to climate change. This is simply a false premise on which to build an argument.
If we want to combat climate change, we need to reduce the amount of carbon and other polluting gases we are putting into the atmosphere, and the best way to do that is to make it more costly to pollute. That is what economists tell us. That is what corporations tell us. That is what indigenous groups tell us.
Making Canada a leader in clean tech and clean energy is what Canadians tell us they expect of their leaders and their county. That is the message that came through loud and clear in Generation Energy, the largest national conversation about energy in our country's history.
We invited Canadians to imagine their energy future. How do they expect the world to look when their kids and grandkids are grown? What should we be doing now to get there? Canadians responded in an unprecedented way, with numbers that are eye-opening. There were more than 380,000 participants, with 31,000 hits on social media, 63 engagement sessions in every part of the country, and more 650 people at the two-day Generation Energy Forum in Winnipeg last fall.
What emerged from Generation Energy was a remarkable, inspiring vision of how Canadians see their energy future. They told us that they want a thriving zero-carbon economy. They want us to be a leader in clean technology. They want an energy system that provides equal opportunities to Canadians without harming the environment. They want indigenous peoples to be part of the decision-making and to benefit from those opportunities.
Canadians are looking for smart cities with integrated energy systems, increased energy efficiency, and low-carbon transportation. They want rural and remote communities to have better options than diesel for generating electricity and heating their homes.
To keep the momentum, the Minister of Natural Resources has created a 14-member Generation Energy Council to provide recommendations on how best to move forward. That council is due to report this summer and will help define Canada's energy future, both here at home and through our international engagements, including at the G7, the G20, and the Clean Energy Ministerial.
This is the forward-looking clean energy future that Canadians seek, and they know that if we are serious about getting there, we need to begin today. Pricing carbon is an important part of that by sending the right signals, encouraging clean energy, discouraging pollution, spurring innovation, and creating new jobs.
The motion before us goes in the opposite direction. It looks to the past, not the future—to things as they were, not things as they are. It appeals to Canadians' worst fears, not their best hope. That is not the way forward for Canada. It is not the way to create the future. It is not the path our government will take.
Natural Resources May 4th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, as I said a moment ago, we are intervening in the reference question filed by B.C. We are doing so because we are confident in our jurisdiction, and we will intervene to defend what is in the national interest. The TMX project is of vital strategic interest to Canada, and it will be built.
We are also actively pursuing legislative options that will assert and reinforce the federal jurisdiction in this matter, which we know we clearly have. Our government has also initiated formal financial discussions with Kinder Morgan, the result of which will be to remove uncertainty overhanging this project.
Natural Resources May 4th, 2018
Mr. Speaker, we are intervening in the reference question filed by B.C. We are confident in our jurisdiction and will intervene to defend the national interest.
The TMX project is of vital strategic interest to Canada, and it will be built. Our government has initiated formal financial discussions with Kinder Morgan, the result of which will be to remove uncertainty overhanging the project.
We are also actively pursuing legislative options that will assert and reinforce the federal jurisdiction in this matter, which we know we clearly have. Hundreds of thousands of hard-working Canadians depend on this project being built.
The Environment April 27th, 2018
Madam Speaker, our government is dedicated to ensuring that safe solutions are in place for managing radioactive waste. Under the federal policy framework, waste owners are responsible, in accordance with the polluter pays principle, for the funding, organization, management, and operation of disposal and other facilities required for their waste. Environmental assessments include several opportunities for the public, indigenous peoples, and interested parties to provide input and to submit comments, up to and including a public hearing.