| Despite the increasing scientific evidence on the urgency of taking action on climate change, environmental issues have been largely neglected during the current federal election campaign.
Only the Green Party has released a detailed environmental platform. The Conservative Party has promised to give tax breaks on transit passes to encourage more people to use public transit, but that’s its only environmental initiative so far, and it’s the only party that doesn’t support the Kyoto Protocol. The Liberals have made no new promises and are campaigning on their record, which environmentalists say hasn’t been stellar. The NDP is promising a new Clean Air Act, a Clean Water Act, a Polluter Pay Act and an expanded home retrofit program to make housing more energy efficient. However, the party hasn’t provided any specific details.
John Bennett, senior policy advisor for the Sierra Club of Canada, describes climate change as a "huge environmental, health and economic calamity heading towards us like a freight train."
"The Conservatives clearly don’t believe that climate change is real and do not intend to do anything," he says. "The other parties don’t seem to be raising it either and when they do, they don’t get media attention."
Conservative environment critic Bob Mills says although his party doesn’t support Kyoto, it does acknowledge climate change and will have a plan to address it. The plan will focus on creating new technology to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), sharing such expertise with developing countries to reduce their GHG emissions and providing incentives for industry and citizens to reduce emissions at home.
Bennett says the Liberal Party has shown a commitment to meeting the Kyoto target of six per cent below 1990 GHG emissions between 2008 and 2012, but the party hasn’t required industry to make large enough reductions.
"They did sell out to the oilpatch. The oilpatch got a sweetheart deal…. We’re disappointed there," he says.
Bennett says the Green Party has some good ideas, but it’s unlikely to be anything but a "spoiler" in some tight races and won’t be able to implement them.
The Sierra Club has tried to get all the political leaders to hold a debate on strictly environmental issues, but has been unsuccessful.
"We need to have much greater involvement from the political leadership to accept the science and to explain the implications of the science to the public," says Bennett. "It gets me quite angry that we don’t get a clear message from the politicians that this is a front-and-centre issue that needs to be taken on."
David Hocking, chief strategist for the David Suzuki Foundation, says he’s "disappointed" that the environment hasn’t featured more prominently.
"It doesn’t get discussed for the most part. It doesn’t get raised. Climate change is extremely important for all of Canada, but especially Western Canada," he says, noting that scientific research is predicting severe drought and water scarcity in Alberta in the future if climate change continues.
Hocking says the NDP, Conservative and Liberal environmental platforms’ are very patchy.
"I’d like to see a comprehensive climate plan that shows this party is looking at the whole problem – not just a tiny slice of it – and has thought it through and actually has policy suggestions that will work," he says.
The NDP, Conservative and Liberal parties are promising to release more detailed environmental platforms soon.
Meanwhile, the Green Party has promised to make a healthy environment, including breathable air and drinkable water, a right under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It has also promised to create 10,000 megawatts of renewable energy by 2010, eliminate subsidies to the oil and gas sector, create new regulations that would penalize industry for polluting, make transit passes completely tax deductible and increase funding for public transit. The Green Party says it would also encourage citizens to produce their own renewable energy through solar, wind or biomass, and would set up a system where consumers could sell any excess energy through the existing power grid. |
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