44th Parl. 1st Sess.

December 7, 2023 10:00AM

Mr. Chris Bittle (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities, Lib.)

Dec/7/23 1:06:22 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I was reflecting, as I believe this is the 18th time we are debating a motion similar to this in this Parliament, back to the last election. In our debates, I said it was refreshing that all of the main parties at that time, in 2021, were running on a price on pollution, including all the members of the Conservative Party who sit here right now. We were actually talking about how we fight climate change. Unfortunately, we are back to a time where one of the parties in the House is debating whether we should fight climate change at all. Its members can see it with their own eyes. They represent ridings that have had severe drought, flooding, fires and hurricanes. Their silence is deafening. The only plank of their environmental plan that comes through, as this is the 18th time we are debating this, is recycling slogans. There are no facts behind anything they are coming forward with. They say that the price on pollution does not work. It is false: 30% of our reductions can be attributed to the price on pollution. That is 30% of our reductions; it is working. An hon. member: That's not true. Mr. Chris Bittle: Mr. Speaker, they are heckling me and saying it is not true. They will not stand up at any point and show any facts. They will yell, slam their desks and heckle. The member for Provencher, who is heckling, represents a province that has suffered from the effects of climate with significant drought, and he is laughing. He thinks this is funny. He thinks his province going through severe drought is funny enough to laugh in the House of Commons. He will get up to talk about the price of food, but laugh when there are drought conditions on the Prairies. What is driving that price? Conservatives are going to talk about the price on pollution, but the impact of food increases is happening the same in the United States, which does not have a price on pollution. They cannot explain that. They will not bring forward any facts on that issue. They will not talk about the rebate Canadians get. They will not talk about how eight out of 10 families get more money back. They will not talk about the report out of the University of Calgary that shows 94% of individuals and families who make less than $50,000 a year end up with more. They want to get rid of the price on pollution. What would that do? It would go straight back to their friends the oil companies. It would go straight back to companies I believe last year made $120 billion in profit, and they claim this trickle-down approach would come back to us somehow. What it would mean is more stock buybacks and no spending on climate progress. It would not have any benefit to us Canadians across the board. Canadians who count on their climate action incentive would look to any government that cancels that and ask where the money is. They do not mention the rebate because they do not want to mention they would cut that rebate, which helps so many families across the board. They want to take Canada out of international discussions. According to the World Bank, there are 73 carbon pricing initiatives currently in place or scheduled to be in place across the globe. These include in Norway, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Chile, New Zealand, Republic of Korea, Germany and of course Ukraine. We cannot forget about Ukraine, which the members on the other side want to make a splash about. They say that they cannot afford a free trade agreement with Ukraine because it mentions a price on pollution. At the end of the day, they are willing to throw Ukraine under the bus. They are willing to throw it under the bus at a time when its president wants this free trade agreement. They talk about lowering the price of food, but they are voting against a country that is one of the breadbaskets of the world. Ukraine needs Canada's support, and this is what it has asked for. The Conservative Party members are so ideological on pricing pollution, when a huge part of the world is behind this, yet they are going to take Canada back. They are going to take Canada back to the benefit of oil companies. They do not care about defending allies such as Ukraine, and they do not care about being a leader on climate. I know that the member from Manitoba laughs that his province is under a drought, but what about the farmers in his community whose yields are down significantly? This is not because of a government policy, but because of the impacts of climate change. However, we do not hear that in any of their speeches. The Conservatives, who do not want a price on pollution and claim that reducing pollution should be borne by industry, should be getting behind the government's latest announcement, which is an emissions reduction plan that would put a cap-and-trade system in place on the oil and gas sector to reduce 30% of emissions, but we are not going to hear that. We are not going to hear support for that plan because, fundamentally, I do not believe that they believe that climate change is real. It is sad that we are back to a Conservative Party that does not believe in climate change. We have heard speech after speech in the House today, and I am not hearing individuals talk about the impacts in their community. However, they can see it with their own eyes. I remember debating a similar motion to this and the smoke was so bad in Ottawa that we could not see across the river in to Gatineau the impacts of climate change were so real. Again, they are laughing. The hon. member from Saskatoon is making a joke. The forest fires in Quebec were so bad, but he stands here and makes a joke. The Conservatives are climate change deniers. This is a big joke to them. They do not care that grain yields are down on the Prairies. They do not care that forests the size of, I believe, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador burnt down this year, but that is a joke. First the member for Provencher laughed at the fact that there is drought in his province, and the member from Saskatoon laughs at climate change. It is a joke to them. This is an existential crisis facing Canadians. However, Conservatives are now claiming that there is no drought on the Prairies. The grain yields are down across the prairies, I guess, by magic—

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