climate policy

Save the Climate Accountability Act, Bill C311

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Don’t Kill the Bill – Save the Climate Accountability Act via “Its Getting Hot In Here” , Dispatches From The Youth Climate Movement:

Bill C-311, the Climate Change Accountability Act is the closest thing to effective climate legislation in Canada, and it needs to move to the third reading before it can be law (i.e. legally binding emission reduction targets).  A surprise motion in the House of Commons has made April 14th a crucial date for the bill, and on Wednesday there will be a vote as to whether or not it should move to the Third and final reading.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Canadian politics, here are some of the basics:

  • There are five parties in government (listed in order of decreasing number of seats in the House of Commons):
    • The Conservative Party (Stephen Harper is the leader)
    • The Liberal Party (Michael Ignatieff is the leader)
    • The Bloc Quebecois (Gilles Duceppe)
    • The New Democratic Party (Jack Layton is the leader)
  • The Conservative party has typically voted unanimously AGAINST the Climate Change Accountability Act
  • The NDP, Bloc, and Greens have typically voted unanimously FOR the Climate Change Accountability Act
  • The Liberals have wavering support (it depends on who is being paid off by the oil companies…my bias)

So what are we gonna do? Target those swinging Liberals!

Folks are calling their Liberal MPs (and Liberal MPs who are not their MPs) and telling them that they need to go to parliament on the 14th and vote to move Bill C-311 to its third reading.  The bill would commit Canada to legally-binding emission reduction targets:  25% below 1990 levels by the year 2020 (which is the lower end of the range that the IPCC is asking for), and long term targets of 80% below 1990 levels by the year 2050.

With the G8 and G20 meetings happening in Toronto this June 25-27th, all eyes are going to be on Canada. The government already embarrassed us in Copenhagen, and we cannot let them do it on our own turf. Don’t Kill Bill.

If you would like to send a letter to all party leaders, visit The Council of Canadians’ Action Alert

For a list of Liberal MPs (and other party MPs) who voted for and against the bill, visit THIS MAGICAL SITE!

For more info, visit http://ourclimate.ca ou visitez http://notreclimate.ca

For information about what community and citizen groups are doing during the G8/G20 visit:

Toronto Community Mobilization Network: http://g20.torontomobilize.org/

People’s Summit: http://peoplessummite2010.ca

G20 Youth Climate Convergence: cycc.convergence@gmail.com

India Emerges as Climate Action Leader While Canada Stays Stuck in Oil Sands

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An article on Yale Environment 360, “In India, a Clear Victory on The Climate Action Front“, discusses a recent sea change in India’s approach to climate change, as evidenced by the resignation of  its Special Envoy of the Prime Minister on Climate Change, Shyam Saran. Saran’s departure, the article points out, is related to the rising influence of Jairem Ramesh, Minister for the Environment and Forests. It is a good thing for a country, and a world, that needs to be moving towards reducing CO2 emissions now, not in 10 or 20 years.

India’s traditional negotiating stance, shaped and defended by Saran, could be summed up in one truculent sentence: The developed world had caused the problem and the developed world should fix it. Ramesh, though, pressed for a change in approach: Though India may not have been part of the problem, he insisted, it had to be part of the solution.

Ramesh has long argued that it is in India’s best interests to address climate change, and is now poised to move India toward low-carbon policies at home and in the international arena.

In his short stint as environment minister, Ramesh has managed to walk a difficult political tightrope. He has moved India’s climate policy forward against the opposition of much of the civil service and India’s influential civil society, both quick to accuse politicians of pandering to outside pressure and failing to defend India’s interests. In an influential speech to Parliament last year, Ramesh argued that it was in India’s own interest to be proactive on climate measures, regardless of international frameworks, because a failure to do so left India’s future prosperity vulnerable to climate shocks. India, he said, should offer a 20 to 25 percent reduction in emissions intensity by 2020, a proactive policy, he argued, that would allow India to claim leadership internationally. It infuriated the traditional climate negotiators who had spent years avoiding any suggestion of leadership.

Closer to home, Ontario will be making another move towards a greener and cleaner economy soon.  Ontario’s Minister of Energy, Brad Duguid, is expected to make an announcement later this month on an ambitious provincial program aimed at helping Ontario’s biggest industrial players become more efficient users of electricity and stronger competitors on the world stage by paying up to 70 per cent of the cost of an energy retrofit. Read more about Watt Guzzlers Get Green Retrofit at the Star.com.

Alas, at the federal level in Canada, as discussed earlier, the Harper Conservatives’ strategy is tied to short-term economic gain in the Alberta oil fields at the expense of Canada’s long-term environmental and economic health.  Contrary to last week’s throne speech penned by the Conservatives, which talked about the need to become a clean energy superpower and lead in green job creation, in reality their policies are set to take Canada in the opposite direction. Read more at Hamilton: Federal Green Strategy Goes From Bad to Worse.

In contrast to Harper’s much-repeated mantra that addressing climate change will hurt the economy, Canada’s economy in the long-run will be much healthier if we embrace, rather than resist, the new green economy.  Harper would be well advised to view the video, Are we fixing fundamentals, or just pretending? It addresses the question “Will the environment lose out to the economy in 2009?” and was made prior to the World Economic Forum meetings in Davos, Switzerland last year.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vJ6Rw1cBMM&feature=player_embedded]

For more information on this video, including the full script, go to TheMostImportantNumber.org.