One of the biggest challenges facing our world today is climate change, sometimes called “everything change.”
How true, when we hear about the wide-reaching effects on plants, fish, wildlife and humans near and far from us.
Our local rivers have fishing restrictions due to alarmingly low and warm waters. Wildfires have devastated properties in B.C. and elsewhere, and the weather is definitely changing, with drought, storms and other extremes of climate behaviour affecting most everyone.
Overall, climate change will alter life as we know it.
With only a few days until the federal election, voters are asking fundamental questions about where the major parties stand on climate change, no doubt influencing where they place their votes on Oct. 19. Canadians already rank climate and environment as a top issue both during and between election cycles.
Here are the climate-change platforms party by party in alphabetical (and non-partisan) order:
Conservative Party of Canada
The Conservatives’ platform on climate change highlights the pledge they put forward for the Paris negotiations to cut Canada’s greenhouse-gas emissions by 30 per cent from 2005 levels, before 2030.
They have made this commitment on a sector-by-sector basis, and one of the sectors left out is the Alberta oilsands.
The Conservatives state they are investing heavily in green energy and energy-efficient technology, announcing future funding for green projects such as a public-transit-fund program that would start in 2017.
Green Party of Canada
The Greens have six top environmental priorities. They would implement a national climate and energy strategy that would include carbon pricing, a national fee-and-dividend carbon tax. They would eliminate all fossil-fuel subsides and invest in infrastructure that promotes renewable energy.
The Green Party stands against all new raw bitumen export schemes; in other words, no oil tankers and pipelines.
It is against further expansion of the Alberta oilsands but wants to protect existing jobs and upgrade and refine the existing raw product. It would also provide retraining for those who have lost their jobs in the oilsands.
The Greens would create a national transportation strategy emphasizing rail, and invest in local public transport. And, finally on the international stage, they would demonstrate climate leadership at the UN Climate Summit 2015.
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberals have promised they will provide national leadership and join the provinces and territories to take action on climate change, put a price on carbon and reduce carbon pollution.
In their election platform, the Liberals have committed to a $2-billion low-carbon economy trust that will fund projects that help reduce carbon emissions.
On the international policy side, the Liberals say they will attend the Paris climate summit and within 90 days establish a pan-Canadian framework for combating climate change. They also state in their election platform that they support the G20 commitment to phasing out subsidies for fossil fuels in the medium term and that they will work with the U.S. and Mexico to develop a long-term North American clean energy and environmental agreement.
New Democratic Party of Canada
The NDP has committed to a nationwide cap-and-trade system that includes a target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from major sources such as the Alberta oilsands.
According to an Environmental Defense report, the NDP’s plan puts Canada on track to reducing greenhouse-gas emissions by 34 per cent by 2025, with a baseline measure of 1990. By 2050, the NDP plan on climate change would see Canada’s emissions drop by 80 per cent.
These targets and commitments would be legislated, making them much more difficult to reverse by future governments.
The NDP also commits to establishing “green bonds” that would allow Canadians to invest up to $4.5 billion over four years in a clean energy, climate-resilient infrastructure, commercial and industrial energy retrofits, and other sustainable development projects.
A further $1.5 billion would be spent over the next four years in “green programs” such as retrofitting homes to be more energy-efficient and local clean-energy projects for northern and remote communities.
If climate change is an important issue to you, the single biggest thing you can do to help fight climate change in Canada is to vote for the party you think is going to make the biggest difference.
Anita Mark of Saanichton is a volunteer with Citizen’s Climate Lobby Canada, a non-partisan organization of volunteer groups pressing for progressive climate legislation.
