Liberal leader Stéphane Dion announced details of the Liberal Party’s Green Shift carbon tax at a party rally in Ottawa.
The plan includes a tax on carbon emissions against big polluters with tax cuts and rebates for individuals intended to offset increased energy prices caused by the tax.
September 7, 2007 - Stephen Harper says Canada will be a world leader in the fight against global warming and in the development of clean energy technology.
Harper chose climate Change as the topic of his address to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Sydney, Australia. He stressed the need for an inclusive approach to reducing greenhouse gas emissions that involves all countries working toward common targets.
We want to be a world leader in the fight against global warming and the development of clean energy technology, we want to lead not by lecturing but by example, we want to share our knowledge and experience, and we want to work with the entire international community in the quest for clean energy.
Harper outlined Canada’s approach, saying the plan could be model for a new international agreement. Canada has set mandatory targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 18% per unit of production over the next 3 years, and then a further 2% reduction in intensity each year after that.
While the short-term targets are intensity-based, Harper says the plan will produce absolute reductions beginning in 2010, leading to a 20% reduction from 2006 levels by 2020, and a 50-70% reduction by 2050.
In addition to mandatory targets, Canada’s climate change plan includes a domestic carbon market and emissions trading regime, a Clean Technology Fund, and the use of international credits such as the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism.
APEC leaders agreed to common “aspirational targets” at the close of the summit the following day, representing the first time both the United States and China have participated in an international climate change declaration. However, the decalaration quickly rejected by environmental groups for not including legally binding targets.
Stéphane Dion responded to speculation the government may prorogue the current session of parliament in order to set a new agenda with a Throne Speech this fall. Any progress on un-passed bills would be lost, unless the government took steps to reintroduce the bills into the new session.
Dion asked the government to carry forward Bill C-30, The Clean Air and Climate Change Act, should they decide to prorogue. Dion also re-stated his demand that the Canada immediately notify its NATO allies that it will end its combat mission in Afghanistan when it expires in 2009.
However, Dion would not commit to defeating the government over these issues, or to supporting a Bloc Québécois threat to bring down the government over Canada’s role in Afghanistan.
May 28 to June 8, 2007 - Prime Minister Stephen Harper takes Canada’s climate change plan to the G-8 meeting in Berlin, saying it can be an example to other nations of how a country can reduce greenhouse gases outside the Kyoto framework.
Harper pressed for an inclusive approach that would allow nations currently without Kyoto targets, who together produce 70% of the world’s greenhouse gases, to participate in an international agreement in the post-Kyoto round of negotiations.
Liberal leader Stéphane Dion, NDP leader Jack Layton, Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, environmentalist David Suzuki continue their opposition to the government’s plan, saying Canada must meet its Kyoto targets beginning 2008.
Leaders at the G-8 agreed for the first time to work toward absolute cuts to greenhouse gas emissions.
February 5, 2007 - Stéphane Dion, Stephen Harper, Michael Ignatieff and John Baird in Question Period on the Opposition motion to force the government to honor its Kyoto Accord commitments, and whether Canada’s Kyoto targets can be met.
December 14, 2006 - Much has been said about Stephen Harper’s reference to “so called” greenhouse gases. Have a look at the entire 5 minute response to questions on the environment that day and come to your own conclusions.
Harper describes his plan to make Canada a leader in environmental technology as the single largest industrial initiative in Canada’s history, promising details by the end of March 2007.
Harper’s plan favours domestic investments into new technologies over the purchase of carbon credits under the Kyoto protocol.
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