Canadian parliament recommits to Kyoto

If the Conservative government does not to meet the terms of this bill the opposition could call a non-confidence vote which would then trigger an election if all opposition parties support it. The government only has a minority in parliament.

Opposition MPs pass Kyoto bill despite Tory resistance
Last Updated: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 | 7:19 PM ET
CBC News
The opposition parties teamed up Wednesday to pass a private member's bill that requires the government to meet international Kyoto targets — despite the Conservatives' attempt to kill the bill hours before the vote.

The bill, which was introduced 10 months ago by Liberal backbencher Pablo Rodriguez, gives the government 60 days to table a detailed plan outlining how Canada will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.

Liberal backbench MP Pablo Rodriguez talks to reporters outside the House of Commons after Question Period Wednesday. He introduced the Kyoto bill that was passed despite opposition from the Conservative government.
(Fred Chartrand/Associated Press) The bill, backed by the NDP and the Bloc Québécois, passed 161-113 on Wednesday night. All the Conservatives who were present voted against it.

"I declare the motion passed," Speaker Peter Milliken said.

The bill urges the government to create fines and jail terms for businesses and industries that over-pollute.

Under the international Kyoto protocol, which was signed by Canada under a previous Liberal government in 1998 and ratified in 2002, the country agreed to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by six per cent from 1990 levels by 2012.

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After Stephen Harper and the Conservatives won the 2006 election, they said Canada's Kyoto commitments were not achievable within the 2012 deadline and would devastate the economy.

Tories tried to get bill declared invalid
Several hours before the vote on Rodriguez's bill on Wednesday, the Speaker turned down a Conservative appeal to have the bill declared invalid.

The Tories argued the bill would force the government to spend money against its will, but Milliken said the bill contained no specific spending measures.

Rodriguez has said that his bill, which is expected to be passed by the Liberal-dominated Senate, would compel the government to act.

"They are bound to it. It's the law of the land," Rodriguez said before the vote. "The prime minister cannot cherry pick laws. He's not the new emperor of Canada.

"The government has to respect it and implement it. If not, we go to the courts," he said.

Rodriguez insisted the bill isn't part of a political game and that it would apply to the Liberals if they win the next election.

However, Environment Minister John Baird says there are no consequences or penalties if the conditions of the bill aren't followed.

"It's really a toothless tiger. All it does is talk about more plans and more studies … we need real action," he said before the vote.

David Docherty, a professor at Wilfrid Laurier University, said it will be up to the opposition to enforce the bill — if it becomes law — and the government doesn't meet the deadline for action.

"Well, if they don't come up with a plan in 60 days, I guess the question is then, how far is the opposition willing to go to make them do that?" Docherty said.

Docherty said the opposition could hold a non-confidence vote if the Conservatives ignore the legislation, but he isn't convinced all three parties are eager to trigger a spring election.

Earlier this month, the House of Commons passed a non-binding motion calling on the government to honour the Kyoto commitments. Harper didn't attend

Kyoto: A socialist plot

NOTE: Stephen Harper, the Canadian Prime Minister, some time ago in a fund raising letter had called Kyoto a socialist plot. It is hardly that or even socialist and only a first step towards solving global environmental problems.

Kyoto: a socialist plot (Duncan Cameron)
Rabble.ca February 7, 2007

Stephen Harper was right when he called the Kyoto protocol a socialist scheme. After all it is an intergovernmental agreement to make corporations reduce greenhouse gas emissions, where tardy rich countries have the option of funding emission reductions in poor countries.

But socialism is more than government trumping corporations, and rich giving to poor. And, most importantly, caring for the environment goes well beyond adhering to Kyoto.

In fact, if you really want to protect the environment, the best measures would resemble a full-blown socialist plot. Green goes best with socialist red.

Most environmentalists, let alone Canadians, would not self-identify as socialists. But democratic planning, public ownership, and mandatory regulation of corporate investment and production have to be part of a serious green agenda. For instance, socializing investment decisions, where the community interest takes precedence over the profit-maximization motive, is an old-fashioned socialist goal.

With climate change focusing our attention, it suddenly makes more sense to think about collective input into choices about not just exploiting natural resources, but about how financial resources are allocated.

The great ruling fiction is that adding up my choices, your choices, and everybody else’s choices, produces the best possible outcome for all. Not only does this approach ignore the existing distribution of income, wealth and access to resources, so that some have lots of market choice while others have none, it also neglects the structure of ownership of productive resources — aka, the means to pollute, and create environmental havoc.

The socialist ethic suggests your choices affect me, and concern us, so we need to agree about what to produce, and how much, and drop the fiction that market choices produce optimal outcomes.

The green ethos suggests that we should produce in a sustainable way, so as to achieve environmentally friendly outcomes.

Planning production is where socialists and the environmental movement can feel free to join hands and sing together. Without such a songfest what we are likely to get is green washing where, say, the main energy companies, take on renewable energy as part of their mission of increasing share holder value, and governments subsidize them to produce wind, solar, and tidal energy.

Turning over alternative energy production to big oil, without regard to the need to directly control and reduce the overall environmental impact of current economic practices is classic bait and switch politics.

Show us the bait, a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, and then switch from the direct regulation approach, to the high cost, and ultimately futile alternative of subsidizing big energy to produce green solutions to problems they are creating daily.

The lowest cost, most efficient way to produce clean energy is to mandate crown corporations to bring alternative energy sources into being. Being under public ownership would facilitate the planned introduction of wind, solar and tidal power. With a federal government guarantee, Crown corporations could borrow the capital they need at the lowest rates going.

Public power at cost was the socialist scheme for hydro-electricity. It is still a good choice for greenhouse gas reduction.

Public ownership, the collective control of green energy sources is the best way to go beyond Kyoto to a truly sustainable future for Canada, and the world.

Duncan Cameron is associate publisher of rabble.ca. He writes from Vancouver.

Text of Stephen Harper Letter on Kyoto

NOTE: The Canadian Alliance party was the precursor to the present Conservative party. The Conservative party was formed by a merger of the Progressive Conservative Party and the Canadian Alliance.

Text of the 2002 Stephen Harper letter on Kyoto
Updated Tue. Jan. 30 2007 6:10 PM ET

Canadian Press

OTTAWA -- Text of a 2002 letter by Stephen Harper to members of his Canadian Alliance party denouncing the Kyoto accord:

Dear Friend,

We're on a roll, folks!

The Canadian Alliance is once again setting the agenda in the House of Commons. Look at what happened in less than two months since Parliament reopened:

We bagged another Liberal cabinet minister when we drove the hapless Lawrence MacAulay to resign for violating the ethics guidelines.
We broke Jean Chretien's chokehold on the House of Commons by getting the election of committee chairs and votes on all private members' bills.
We finally (!) got the Liberals to agree to set up a national registry for sex offenders.
But we can't just relax and declare victory. We're gearing up for the biggest struggle our party has faced since you entrusted me with the leadership. I'm talking about the "battle of Kyoto'' -- our campaign to block the job-killing, economy-destroying Kyoto Accord.

It would take more than one letter to explain what's wrong with Kyoto, but here are a few facts about this so-called "Accord'':

It's based on tentative and contradictory scientific evidence about climate trends.
It focuses on carbon dioxide, which is essential to life, rather than upon pollutants.
Canada is the only country in the world required to make significant cuts in emissions. Third World countries are exempt, the Europeans get credit for shutting down inefficient Soviet-era industries, and no country in the Western hemisphere except Canada is signing.
Implementing Kyoto will cripple the oil and gas industry, which is essential to the economies of Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia.
As the effects trickle through other industries, workers and consumers everywhere in Canada will lose. THERE ARE NO CANADIAN WINNERS UNDER THE KYOTO ACCORD.
The only winners will be countries such as Russia, India, and China, from which Canada will have to buy "emissions credits.'' Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations.
On top of all this, Kyoto will not even reduce greenhouse gases. By encouraging transfer of industrial production to Third World countries where emissions standards are more relaxed, it will almost certainly increase emissions on a global scale.
For a long time, the Canadian Alliance stood virtually alone in opposing the Kyoto Accord, as Bob Mills, our senior environment critic, waged a valiant battle against it. Now, however, allies are stepping forward -- eight of 10 provincial governments, and a broad coalition of businesses across Canada -- to help us fight the "battle of Kyoto.''

Jean Chretien says he will introduce a resolution to ratify Kyoto into Parliament and get it passed before Christmas. We will do everything we can to stop him there, but he might get it passed with the help of the socialists in the NDP and the separatists in the BQ.

But the "battle of Kyoto'' is just beginning. Ratification is merely symbolic; Kyoto will not take effect unless and until it is implemented by legislation. We will go to the wall to stop that legislation and at that point we will be on much stronger procedural ground than in trying to block a mere resolution.

The Reform Party defeated the Charlottetown Accord in an epic struggle in the fall of 1992. Now the Canadian Alliance is leading the battle against the Kyoto Accord!

But we can't do it alone. It will take an army of Canadians to beat Kyoto, just as it did to beat Charlottetown.

We can't stop Kyoto just in Parliament. We need your help at all levels. We need you to inform yourself about Kyoto, to discuss it with your friends and neighbours, and to write protest letters to newspapers and the government.

And, yes, we need your gifts of money. The "battle of Kyoto'' is going to lead directly into the next election. We need your contribution of $500, or $250, or $100, or whatever you can afford, to help us drive the Liberals from power.

Yours truly,

Stephen Harper, MP

Leader of the Opposition

PS: The "battle of Kyoto'' shows why the Canadian Alliance is so important to you and to Canada. All the other federal parties are supporting Kyoto (Liberals, NDP, BQ) or speaking out of both sides of their mouth (Tories). Only the Canadian Alliance is strong and fearless enough to block dangerous and destructive schemes like the Charlottetown Accord and the Kyoto Accord.

Harper Haunted by Letters Past

It is interesting that Harper did not say straight out that he no longer believes the position outlined in his letter. He did say though that he accepted the science and was going to act. THe NDP seems to be co-operating with the Conservatives to at least get stronger environmental legislation passed. The Conservatives were also on the attack against the Liberal environmental record a easy target since the Liberals did little to meet Kyoto targets.


Kyoto letter has come back to haunt Harper, Liberal MPs say
Last Updated: Wednesday, January 31, 2007 | 4:36 PM ET
CBC News
Opposition Liberal MPs demanded Wednesday that Prime Minister Stephen Harper explain a letter he apparently wrote five years ago in which he derides the Kyoto accord.

Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion asked Harper twice in question period to indicate whether his position on the issue has changed.

"Canada is unfortunate enough to have a prime minister who is a climate change denier," Dion said in the House of Commons.

"A real leader says he was wrong and says, 'I agree I was wrong and I changed my mind,'" he said.

In the letter, written in 2002, Harper describes Kyoto as a "socialist scheme" designed to suck money out of rich countries.

"Will he admit that the new environmental facade is just an attempt to mislead the Canadian people?" asked Dion.

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The letter, on the federal Liberal party website, was apparently written by Harper when he was leader of the now-defunct Canadian Alliance party.

Government acting: Harper
Harper, who did not acknowledge in question period that he wrote the letter, replied to Dion: "This government has made it clear in the election campaign that we accept the science and that's why we're acting."

He said the government has acted by introducing Canada's clean air act, proposed legislation to deal with greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution. It is before a special legislative committee.

Harper added that Dion should give a new name to his dog, known as Kyoto, to reflect "various denials" by the Liberals on important issues.

Harper said Dion could call his dog Clean Air, Fiscal Imbalance, or even The Sponsorship Scandal.

The prime minister said later he believes there should be a world conference on climate change and he would be willing to go to such a meeting.

"We all recognize this is a serious environmental problem that needs immediate action," Harper told the House of Commons.

"Canada's decision to do nothing over the past decade was a mistake and we want to do better."

Environment Minister John Baird came to Harper's defence over the letter, quoting passages from Liberal MPs who had criticized Kyoto.

Baird said the Liberals had done nothing to cut greenhouse gases while they were power.

'Prisoners of past beliefs'
Earlier on Parliament Hill, other Liberal MPs said the past has come back to haunt Harper.

"People are prisoners of their past beliefs," said Michael Ignatieff, Liberal MP for Etobicoke-Lakeshore.

"It's very difficult for a leopard to change its spots."

John McCallum, Liberal MP for Markham-Unionville, said: "That's the real Mr. Harper. Today's Mr. Harper is the one who reads polls."

Conservative MPs, meanwhile, when asked before question period about the letter, dismissed its importance and said they do not think much of Kyoto anyway.

"I hear it's a dog," Tory caucus whip Jay Hill said.

Saskatchewan MP Andrew Scheer said: "The Kyoto accord itself doesn't do a whole lot — as we've seen with the Liberal record — to reduce greenhouse gases.

"It's a trading system, a transfer of wealth from one part of the world to another."