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Context: House Hansard - 169 - Mar/20/23

Mrs. Dominique Vien (Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, CPC)

Mar/20/23 2:12:44 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, terrible tragedies have happened in Quebec, just days apart. On Thursday, a fire in Old Montreal cost the life of at least one person, with six others still missing. On Friday, three people from the same family lost their lives following a murderous attack in the Rosemont—La Petite‑Patrie neighbourhood, also in Montreal. This crime was exceptionally violent. It shocked everyone in the community and saddened the entire province, which had just witnessed another tragic event. In Amqui, a pickup truck crashed into 11 people who were strolling down the street, enjoying the spring weather. Three people died and several others were seriously injured. In tragic moments like these, let us spare a thought for the victims and for their loved ones, who are feeling such deep sorrow. On behalf of my leader and my political party, I offer my deepest condolences to all those affected.

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Context: House Hansard - 169 - Mar/20/23

Hon. Dominic LeBlanc (Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, Infrastructure and Communities, Lib.)

Mar/20/23 3:03:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, on the contrary, we will not deny the municipalities of Quebec or the Government of Quebec federal funding for projects as important as the public transit projects my colleague talked about. For example, look at the blue line in Montreal or the tramway in Quebec City. These are essential projects that I address in my discussions with the mayor of Quebec City and the mayor of Longueuil. We have always said that we would be there with the Government of Quebec to support important projects for the economic and environmental future of Quebec and Canada. I am confident that we will conclude this important agreement in the next few days.

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Context: House Hansard - 169 - Mar/20/23

Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP)

Mar/20/23 6:17:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a privilege to rise in the House on the lands of the Algonquin Anishinabe peoples. I am speaking today as a follow-up to a question that one might think was stale-dated, but it gives us an opportunity to pursue what was a remarkable success in Montreal at the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity. It is nice to be able to recognize the success of anything in this stage of a planet on fire and biodiversity in free fall. I raised this matter at the end of November, before the conference occurred, when I was asking if the Prime Minister would be able to raise the profile of this event and encourage other world leaders to come; that question is definitely stale-dated. However, the results of what happened at COP15, which is titled the “Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework” after the city in China where this event was supposed to have happened, as well as the global goals for 2050, are worth taking the time to recognize right now. I am grateful that the parliamentary secretary is here for the adjournment discussion. What did we accomplish? I will say, which I have not had a chance to say in this place, that the hon. Minister of Environment did a great job in negotiating and keeping some diplomatic heavy lifting going. This was a convention discussion where the cards that were dealt on this were not good; they were pretty bad. COP15 was supposed to have happened in September 2020. There were all the delays because of COVID, but the geopolitical cards were not good either. At basically the last minute, in June 2022, Canada said to the People's Republic of China that clearly it did not have a place to host this right now. Montreal is the host city of the Secretariat for the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, so Canada offered to step up and invite everybody here. When I say “last minute”, six months may sound like a lot of time to people, but we know what it is like if we suddenly decide we are going to invite 30 friends for dinner at four o'clock in the afternoon, and they are due at seven o'clock. In UN terms, that is what we did. The dynamic here was very challenging in that the People's Republic of China remained the host in the context of being in charge. It was, in UN terms, the president of the COP. This meant that our Minister of Environment was a physical host in Montreal. Again, I give credit to the Minister of Environment; he actually put himself into an interesting position and worked in a very unusual diplomatic, successful partnership with the minister of environment for the People's Republic of China. What did we accomplish there? The goals are many and they are detailed. Today, I want to speak to today the 23 detailed targets. However, I am afraid that what we are going to see is the typical response out of Environment Canada: Here we go, our targets are 25% by 2025 and 30% by 2030. Then it becomes a job of drawing lines on a map. The targets are not about lines on the map, which might even do a disservice to the targets of slashing pesticide use, reducing food waste and recognizing mother earth and indigenous sovereignty. These goals require far more transformational changes than lines on a map, where if an area is outside that line, it will be decimated. We need to focus and plan.

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