44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 3, 2024 10:00AM
- May/3/24 11:43:40 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Canada's greenhouse gas emissions increased in 2021-22. That is why the advisory board appointed by the Minister of Environment himself is issuing a warning: Climate policies work when they exist.
In other words, they do not work when they do not exist, for example, in the oil industry, where emissions continue to rise. Emissions are going to skyrocket with the opening of the Trans Mountain pipeline, a new dirty oil pipeline, on Wednesday, given that there is no emissions cap on oil.
When will the minister rein in oil companies instead of opening pipelines?
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- May/3/24 11:44:18 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would invite my colleague to carefully read the report that was published yesterday because it states that Canada's greenhouse gas emissions are 44 million tonnes less than they were before the pandemic in 2019. That is equivalent to taking 13 million vehicles, or half of Canada's vehicle fleet, off the roads.
The last time that greenhouse gas emissions were so low in Canada, Connor McDavid from the Edmonton Oilers had just been born, O.J. Simpson was on trial and the google.com domain name had just been purchased.
Our plan is working. We need to continue to fight climate change.
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- May/3/24 11:45:00 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the minister was quite proud to say that Canada was “the only major oil producer in the world that has proposed putting a cap on these emissions”. The key word here is “proposed” instead of “imposed”.
I would remind the minister that he once was more ambitious than simply being better than Russia or Saudi Arabia when it comes to progressive policies. While he is proposing to do better than them, he is opening a brand-new pipeline: Trans Mountain.
When will there be any action on reducing, not increasing, emissions?
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- May/3/24 11:45:37 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind my colleague that if she bothered to read the report, she would see that our record between 2019 and 2021 is the same as Germany's or even Italy's and that it is better than that of the United States of America.
We are not talking about Russia or Iran here, but the United States of America. Our performance on fighting climate change is better than our neighbour to the south.
We have tabled the consultation document to impose a cap on greenhouse gas emissions. I have said that we would have draft regulations this year and final regulations by next year.
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- May/3/24 11:54:02 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the other day I was thinking about why it is so important for Canada to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. It is important for the economy. Obviously, economic prosperity and ecological prosperity go hand in hand. I was looking at the national inventory report, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that we have reduced greenhouse gas emissions.
I would like to ask the environment minister what the next steps are to ensure we continue on the right track.
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- May/3/24 11:54:43 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for her question.
In fact, yesterday's report demonstrates—and this has been confirmed by the independent Canadian Climate Institute, for one—that we are on track to meet our 2026 interim targets and the 2030 goal. This will be a first in Canadian history.
Between 2019 and 2022, we reduced greenhouse gas emissions in Canada by the equivalent of 15 million vehicles taken off our roads, but we need to do more. I completely agree. That is why we are working on new regulations for a carbon-neutral electricity grid by 2035 as well as regulations for a cap on greenhouse gas emissions, which will be announced shortly.
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Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to speak to the private member's bill before us, Bill C-375, regarding federal-provincial agreements in the Impact Assessment Act. We appreciate the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent's interest in the Impact Assessment Act, which plays an important role in sustainable development and economic prosperity in Canada.
We need an efficient and effective review process for clean energy, critical minerals, transportation, and other major projects to keep our economy competitive while creating good, well-paying jobs. We recognize the important role that our natural resource and clean energy sectors play in ensuring the prosperity of our country while meeting our emissions reduction targets. These targets include reducing emissions to 40% below 2005 levels by 2030, a net-zero electricity grid by 2035 and overall net-zero emissions by 2050. An efficient and robust regulatory system is essential to advancing the projects that will help achieve the net-zero targets, and the Impact Assessment Act is an important part of this system to ensure that a clean environment and a strong economy go hand in hand.
While the Supreme Court of Canada provided direction on specific changes needed to the Impact Assessment Act, changes that we recently tabled as part of the budget implementation bill, the court also confirmed the role of the Parliament of Canada to enact impact assessment legislation to “minimize the risks that some major projects pose to the environment”. The court recognized the clear federal role and the clear need for federal impact assessment legislation. In its decision on the Impact Assessment Act, the court underscored the need to exercise cooperative federalism, respecting the authority of each jurisdiction.
The Government of Canada is keen to work cooperatively with every jurisdiction under the Impact Assessment Act. Bill C-375 has been introduced under the veil of provincial cooperation. However, it would result in the provincial assessment process being the only process for projects subject to an agreement. Bill C-375 aims to promote agreements between the minister and a provincial government to exempt potentially wide ranges of projects from the Impact Assessment Act.
The Impact Assessment Act already focuses only on those major projects that are most likely to have the potential for significant adverse effects in areas of federal jurisdiction. Blanket exemptions of these projects from federal assessment without appropriate safeguards does not mean they would be done in collaboration. What it means is that the federal government would no longer have the authority to manage what is clearly its responsibility, with no role in determining the potential effects of a proposed project that are within its own jurisdiction, nor be able to identify ways to mitigate those effects or even decide whether those effects within its own jurisdiction are in the best interest of Canadians. This is contrary to cooperative federalism, which the Supreme Court of Canada encouraged.
The Supreme Court of Canada was clear that we must respect each other's jurisdiction, but we also must work together. By working together in coordinating regulatory processes, we achieve our collective goal of attracting investment and projects that advance a low-carbon economy while protecting the environment and indigenous rights. Co-operation and coordination are central objectives of the Impact Assessment Act to ensure that impact assessments are done as efficiently as possible. The Impact Assessment Act already requires that the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada offer to consult with other jurisdictions on project assessments, both up front during initial planning and throughout an impact assessment. By working together, we can clearly focus federal involvement on those matters that are squarely within federal jurisdiction.
This provides process certainty and reduces duplication during project reviews. The Impact Assessment Act includes tools that allow for coordinated assessments, delegation of aspects of the federal impact assessment to another jurisdiction, joint review panels and substitution, where a provincial process can replace the federal process.
These legislated tools reflect the flexibility needed for co-operation; they can be tailored to meet the needs of each jurisdiction and can include sharing information and expertise; coordinating or jointly undertaking activities, such as public comment periods, indigenous engagement and consultations, instructions to proponents and technical reviews; and substitution of a provincial process for a federal process.
We know these tools can work. We have had tremendous success under an agreement with British Columbia. Particularly, the provincial process is used as a substitution for the federal assessment process. At the same time, both orders of government retain the ability to exercise their responsibility to decide on whether effects within their jurisdiction are in the public interest.
We are keen to extend this success to other provinces and truly achieve the objective of “one project, one assessment”. To this end, and in response to the Supreme Court, the Government of Canada announced amendments to the Impact Assessment Act that would further advance this principle. This was done through budget 2024, entitled “Fairness for Every Generation”.
The amended act, as proposed through the budget implementation bill, would provide certainty for businesses and investors through measures that include increased flexibility to co-develop a harmonized approach to assessments. Here, the federal government and a province or indigenous jurisdiction can enter agreements to share responsibility for different elements of assessment. This approach would greatly reduce duplication and result in the best-placed jurisdiction undertaking the most appropriate aspects of an assessment, which would be set out in agreements.
Importantly, federal obligations with respect to the consideration of indigenous knowledge and indigenous consultations would be maintained. Final decisions would remain with each jurisdiction, ensuring accountability to the public on effects within respective areas of jurisdiction.
The Impact Assessment Act also seeks to maximize leadership of indigenous peoples in impact assessment processes and enables co-operation with indigenous jurisdictions in recognition of our nation-to-nation relationships. Bill C-375 does not recognize the unique role of indigenous peoples in the Crown's assessment of impacts of major projects. The Impact Assessment Act recognizes the special constitutional relationship between the Crown and indigenous peoples and the particular perspectives and interests they bring to the process.
The proposed private member's bill should not be viewed as a tool for collaboration. Instead, it would create a tool to effectively eliminate any co-operation by removing federal requirements from impact assessments altogether. The ultimate goal of the bill is to have no federal impact assessment requirements apply and to eliminate federal decision-making in assessments of major projects, even where there is clear federal jurisdiction.
We already have the tools needed to collaborate effectively with provinces under the IAA, and these would be strengthened through amendments proposed in the budget implementation bill. I encourage my colleagues to reject the proposed private member's bill and focus on supporting true co-operation under the Impact Assessment Act.
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Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to speak to this bill.
The issue of impact assessments and environmental studies is significant, given that Quebec, Canada and the entire world are going through an extremely intense environmental crisis, biodiversity crisis and climate crisis.
I was a bit surprised by the speech by the member for Repentigny, who is a Bloc Québécois member. I would like to remind her that, unfortunately, pollution and greenhouse gases do not recognize provincial borders. What is happening in the Prairies, out west or up north has consequences on the lives of Quebeckers.
I would also like to take this opportunity to give a bit of background, because an important report was released by Environment and Climate Change Canada this week. The report indicated that Canada's greenhouse gas emissions increased by 10 megatonnes between 2021 and 2022. The Minister of Environment and Climate Change was very pleased about that. To quote a well-known film, I could say, “and he is happy”. That is mind-boggling, because he is saying that at least the numbers are better than they were in 2019. They are better than they were in 2019 because something happened in 2020 that had a pretty major impact on our greenhouse gas emissions. It was the pandemic. COVID-19 is saving the current environment minister's statistics. Had it not been for the pandemic, there would be no reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
Let me put things in context. What we have also learned is that, from 2005 to 2022, Canada's overall emissions decreased by a measly 7%. That decrease is mainly attributable to the pandemic, which all but wiped out economic development, trade, travel and so on. The economy had to be put on pause for there to be a significant drop in greenhouse gas emissions. If we factor out the pandemic, the Liberals' plan is not working.
The Liberal government's current target is a 45% drop in emissions by 2030. Emissions have dropped 7% in 19 years. There are five and a half years left to do the rest, that is, to reduce emissions by 38%. We have barely managed to reduce emissions by 7% between 2005 and 2022, and that included the pandemic period. Now they would have us believe that we are going to cut emissions by 38% in five and a half years. This makes no sense, unless we have a pandemic every year. It is our choice. It has to be one or the other.
All this is happening while the Liberals are running hot and cold. They are incapable of really taking on the big polluters and big oil companies who are largely responsible for the current situation. That is because of all their projects, including the Trans Mountain project, the pipeline they bought with our money to the tune of $34 billion.
What we found out through the work of journalists at The Globe and Mail was that the Liberals were about to impose a special tax, a special tax on the excessive profits of oil and gas companies, but at the last minute, under lobbyist pressure, they backed down. It disappeared from the budget. That is what The Globe and Mail is reporting. It just goes to show how much sway the oil lobby has over the Conservatives or the Liberals.
Before I tackle the bill specifically, I would like to point out that the oil and gas sector has the highest share of GHG emissions, at 31%. It is the fastest-growing sector, the sector with the fastest-rising environmental impact and the heaviest polluter. We all know that the best way to stop this insanity is to cap oil and gas sector emissions.
The Liberals and the Minister of Environment, the member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie, keep promising that they will do this, but we are still waiting. Today, during question period, we found out that they have promised to publish draft regulations. Wow, we are going to get draft regulations. We are going to get the beginnings of an outline for some regulations that may or may not materialize someday. If that is not the government dragging its feet and straining people's credulity, I do not know what is.
The issue is urgent. We need a cap on oil and gas emissions, but the environment minister thinks it can wait a while longer.
This cannot wait. The Alberta government said a few weeks ago that the forest fire season had already started. It is expected to be even worse this year than it was last year. My NDP colleague from Victoria said she never thought she would ever see forest fires start in British Columbia before winter was over. That is the new reality.
If people breathed in smoke last summer, they had better brace themselves, because this summer will be even worse. It is possible that last summer will be the best summer we will have for the next 10 years. I take no pleasure in saying that. People are getting sick and dying from air pollution, from forest fires and from fine particles in the air. That is the reality.
We need legislation on the impact assessment process for major projects to ensure that we meet our Paris Agreement targets, uphold our commitments on biodiversity and our treaties with indigenous peoples in the spirit of reconciliation, and show respect for local communities through proper consultations.
I understand where the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent is coming from when he says that we need to avoid redundancy. One process is better than two. I am just saying that we need to be careful. The federal government has specific responsibilities, particularly when it comes to biodiversity and wildlife. I think that it is important to have a process for ensuring that projects comply with our international treaty obligations, particularly the Paris Agreement, and that we meet our specific responsibilities toward indigenous peoples and species at risk, in terms of biodiversity. If the government steps back from the process as this bill suggests, it will give some provinces the opportunity to unilaterally approve projects that will have a major impact on all Canadians. The NDP is worried provinces may rubber-stamp projects, speeding up the approval process to say yes to everything, which will increase the negative impacts on our environment and ecosystems. This is an important issue for us. We voted against Bill C-69 because we did not think that it went far enough, because it did not have enough teeth and because we were concerned that it gave the minister far too much discretion.
However, it has already been used. This law was used to delay an expansion of the Vista coal mine in central Alberta after civil society groups and activists fought hard for an environmental assessment of the project and for a number of their concerns to be addressed.
Given the ongoing environmental and climate crisis, the NDP is very reluctant to give up a tool that can effect change. We cannot simply say that if the province is doing it, everything is okay, without taking a look. As we see it, this would mean certain Conservative provincial governments could approve some projects that will have a major impact on everyone and that will not comply with our international agreements. We believe in strong, firm measures. The federal government needs to be present, watchful, and capable of shouldering its environmental protection role and going after big polluters like the oil and gas sector.
The Impact Assessment Act is an important tool for keeping our air and water clean and ensuring a healthy environment and healthy surroundings for everyone.
In closing, I would say that we cannot overlook the fact that, as far as greenhouse gas emissions and pollution are concerned, borders, provinces and countries do not exist. We believe in taking responsibility and keeping watch for the sake of our future and our children's future.
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