Environment committee  I'm a sustainable finance analyst at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, where I work on climate and broader environmentally related financial risks. It is well recognized, both internationally and in Canada, that climate change and environmental issues pose risks to the financial system through physical and transition risk channels. Moreover, the financial system will play a crucial role in financing the necessary activities to achieve regional and global decarbonization targets to mitigate future fiscal risks from climate change.

Environment committee  For more than a decade, IBC has been warning governments about the need to be better prepared for severe weather events as a result of climate change. We believe Canada must play both offence and defence when it comes to climate change and take action today to protect Canadians from the growing threats to their homes and well-being.

Environment committee  And yet in your opening address, you said that you acknowledged the crucial importance of combatting climate change. What's more crucially important: combatting climate change or promoting Canada's oil interests?

Environment committee  When I asked you earlier whether the system was ready to cope with climate change, I was thinking of what the OECD was saying.

Environment committee  I've read that Canada's insured losses over the last couple of years due to wildfires and other natural disaster events that are fuelled by climate change—not always caused by climate change, which causes a little bit of consternation sometimes in this committee—have increased markedly and so have the insured losses. Can you talk a bit about why that's the case and, if it is, the degree to which it's true?

Environment committee  Understanding the optimal role of business and finance in forging the social, environmental and economic outcomes we all desire requires a sober analysis of the challenge of climate change itself, as well as a deeper appreciation of essential fiduciary rules, the determinant roles of consumers and regulators, and the ancillary role of commerce. Financiers and businesses have no special powers nor any innate responsibility to right others' wrongs or turn the carbon clock backwards.

Environment committee  It is broadly acknowledged that climate change poses a significant challenge to business, from the high cost of disruptive events to increased uncertainty for companies in what and how they should invest. Our financial system is, of course, also exposed to these risks.

Environment committee  Could you write to the committee and talk a bit about how efforts by Canada's financial institutions to address biodiversity loss connect to efforts to address the climate crisis and climate change, and how these are overlapping and intersecting? Also, then—

Environment committee  Most relevant to this session is that we convene several of the net-zero alliances, including the net-zero banking alliance and the net-zero asset owner alliance, which many Canadian financial institutions have signed on to as a means of setting credible, science-based net-zero targets. As well documented by the Basel committee on banking supervision and many others, climate change poses risks to the financial system. Just last month, the Basel committee formally incorporated climate risks into its core principles, which set out the overarching standards for regulations to keep the global financial system stable.

Environment committee  Sorry for interrupting, but I only have two minutes. You don't appear to see a connection between climate change and fossil fuel extraction. My question could be for you or for the representatives of the Insurance Bureau of Canada. It's about certain boards of directors that have been infiltrated or influenced by fossil fuel industry representatives.

Environment committee  Could you describe why those are so important as enabling conditions to attract additional investment and mobilize capital to fight climate change?

Environment committee  You need to stop consuming fossil fuels and switch to a much cleaner energy mix. In Canada's case, that would be more nuclear. Climate change is a huge challenge, but describing it as an existential threat is an excellent example—I won't use the word “hysterical”—of gross exaggeration that actually clouds clear thinking on the matter.

Environment committee  OSFI puts additional limitations on us to not overly invest in a single company or a single-industry series of companies in order to ensure that we have the reserves available to pay out to policyholders. I would say that it's incredibly important. We are very seized with climate change, particularly the physical-risk side of things that we're already seeing.

Environment committee  If the banks are required to provide a higher level of disclosure about their investment and loan portfolios in terms of financial risks resulting from climate change, then of course they would be required to disclose their investments in, and loans to, the fossil energy industry. Here again, connections were made between disclosure and disinvestment.

Environment committee  Do you feel that the Canadian financial system is ready at this time to face the risks involved in climate change?