SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 270 - Jan/29/24

Jan/29/24 8:31:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to start by wishing the parliamentary secretary a very happy birthday. In the past few years, Canadians have witnessed record-breaking temperatures, extreme weather events, forest fires and flooding. People have been evacuated from their homes and whole towns have been wiped out, yet under the Liberal government, big oil and gas are polluting more than ever. A recent report shows how these oil giants are significantly under-reporting their emissions. In fact, emissions from the oil sands are potentially 6,300% higher than what is reported by the industry. Scientists have confirmed what indigenous communities from northern Alberta have been saying for decades. These massive corporations are threatening their health, threatening their livelihoods and poisoning their land. This is making people sick. Oil and gas companies are pumping out carbon emissions at shockingly high rates, and the government can and should make these companies use some of their record-breaking profits to clean up their mess. Oil and gas CEOs are giving themselves raises, being rewarded with obscene bonuses, and making millions of dollars a year, while Canadians are struggling just to get by. They are worried about how they are going to pay rent and worried about how they are going to make their mortgage payments. At the same time, Canadians are facing record-breaking temperatures, the worst wildfire season on record and devastating weather events. We are in a climate emergency, so why does the Liberal government refuse to hold oil and gas giants accountable? After dragging their feet and having to be pushed to finally deliver a cap on emissions for the oil and gas sector, the Liberals announced a watered-down cap, full of loopholes, that had oil and gas lobbyists' fingerprints all over it. The oil and gas sector makes up the biggest portion of Canada’s emissions, and environmental experts have said that Canada must have a hard cap on oil and gas emissions if we have any hope of meeting our climate targets. The Liberals have set a target of reducing Canada’s overall emissions by 42%, but they are giving their friends in oil and gas a break. Not only did they give oil and gas a lower target, but they have included the option for companies to buy offsets and essentially buy their way out of the cap. They admit their plan will only reduce oil and gas emission by about 20%. This means every other sector and everyday Canadians will have to pick up the slack. The Liberals are making life harder for people, workers and families. Can the member explain to me why they are making life easier for oil and gas CEOs?

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Mr. Adam van Koeverden (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and to the Minister of Sport and Physical Activity, Lib.)

Jan/29/24 8:34:28 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague and friend for the well wishes on my birthday and for standing up for climate action at this time. I cannot say enough or emphasize strongly enough how nice it is to stand up in the House of Commons and talk about how we fight climate change, not whether we fight climate change. With the Conservatives, day after day, asking the majority of the questions in this House, it is a challenge occasionally. The vast majority of Canadians I talk to, the vast majority of Canadians, full stop, demand climate action. They want to help lower our emissions. They want our government to take strong action, and one of those strong actions was indeed our oil and gas emissions cap. It was just in December that our government, with the Minister of Environment and Climate Change at COP, announced a very ambitious plan to lower our emissions with an oil and gas emissions cap. It is the first of its kind in the world. We are the fourth-largest producer of oil and gas in the world, and we are the first-ever country to produce a cap on emissions from oil and gas production. It is going to lead the way on lowering emissions from this sector as we reduce our reliance on fossil fuels going forward. Like I said, as the world's fourth-largest producer, it is a strong signal that we are sending internationally to the sector and to our colleagues in the G7 and G20. We are taking a leadership role in the energy transition. We are aiming to achieve net-zero emissions from the oil and gas sector by 2050, and the emissions cap will ensure that we get there. The challenge, of course, is to reduce emissions while building a stronger, more resilient economy of the 21st century. That is why we are not doing this alone. It requires consultation with the sector to ensure that we are protecting jobs and recognizing that oil and gas still have a role to play in our economy and our society. Last December, we published a proposed regulatory framework, and we look forward to hearing from stakeholders on the approach in this document in the months ahead. On a more personal note, I am a member of the environment committee, and I am looking forward to working more closely with my colleague from Victoria on the environment committee. We had the CEO of Imperial Oil at committee, late in the last session. I had the opportunity to question that CEO, who earns, as the member mentioned, about $17 million a year. He earns that money for taking something from the planet and leaving it in a worse place. The oil and gas sector and the oil sands, as the member rightly pointed out, are responsible for the largest proportion of Canada's emissions, but it is also the most carbon-intensive fuel in the world. It has been shown just recently, in an article that I think we both read, that it is up to 6,500% higher than reported. For some of those compounds, which are called organic compounds, the rate at which they are going into the atmosphere is upwards of 6,000% higher than had been indicated, which is absolutely atrocious. The question I had for that CEO was about the Kearl spill with respect to effluent from tailings ponds. They insist that those tailings releases, as they call them, into a tailings pond have no effect on the environment and no effect on people's health, which is absolutely untrue. It is absolutely not accurate to suggest that there is no effect. It is having an impact on water quality. It is having an impact on cancer rates. It is having a deleterious impact on the environment and the health of first nations around the Athabasca watershed. It is an absolute travesty. I could not agree with my colleague more that we need to do more to ensure that we are protecting the environment from the oil and gas sector, and the oil and gas emissions cap is one way that we are doing that.

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Ms. Laurel Collins

Jan/29/24 8:38:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I believe the member is genuinely sincere in his desire to do more, and I agree that the Conservatives' climate denial is beyond disheartening, but Canadians do not want to have to choose between denial and delay. They do not want to have to choose between bad and worse. The reality is we are in a climate emergency. We do not have time for Liberal excuses. We do not have time for Liberal broken promises. We definitely do not have time for a government that caters to oil and gas interests. Our planet is burning. When will the government stop disappointing Canadians, stop giving breaks to its rich friends and stop listening to oil and gas CEOs who are raking in record profits and unreal bonuses while polluting our planet, and instead start treating this like the emergency that it is, close the loopholes and bring in a hard cap on emissions?

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Mr. Adam van Koeverden

Jan/29/24 8:39:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, once again I want to emphasize that the CEO of Imperial Oil, Brad Corson, is not my friend. He is no friend of the environment, this government or the planet. That company is destroying the planet. Those operations are having a negative impact on the health and the well-being of the natural environment and the people who live on those lands and have done so, in the case of the first nations at Kearl, for millennia. We will continue to hold oil and gas companies to account, and I will continue to demand better from oil and gas executives. However, our measures are working. We need to see the big picture on overall emissions. Overall, our emissions in Canada are on target, and they are coming down. In 2015, Canada was on a path for emissions in 2030 to be 9% higher than they were in 2005. Today, thanks to the work of so many Canadians, including that member, we are ahead of our initial 2030 target and firmly on track to meet the targets set out in our 2030 emissions reduction plan.

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Mrs. Rosemarie Falk (Battlefords—Lloydminster, CPC)

Jan/29/24 8:40:46 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, after eight years of the Liberal government, the cost of living is unaffordable in this country. Hard-working Canadians are struggling to put food on their tables and gas in their tanks, as well as to keep a roof over their heads. This is the devastating reality across the country; prices on food, home heating, gas and just about everything continue to go up. The most recent food price report predicted that the amount of money spent by the average family on food increases would go up by another $700 this year. That is on top of year-over-year increases. Canada is in an affordability crisis, and it is a direct result of the incompetence and the failed policies of the Liberal government and, of course, its costly coalition. It is continuing to fuel this with its inflationary deficits and its costly and ineffective carbon taxes. The carbon tax scheme is making Canadian families choose among eating, heating and other necessities. Food insecurity is soaring. In a country such as Canada and a province such as Saskatchewan, which has incredible, hard-working and innovative farmers and a wealth of agricultural opportunities, the reality that food insecurity is at a point of crisis in this country is truly unbelievable. However, this is the reality when we have a Prime Minister who is intent on punishing Canadians with his nonsensical and ideologically driven carbon tax policy. In clinging to this disastrous policy, which has proven to do nothing for the environment, the Prime Minister has essentially told Canadians that it is more important for him to collect the carbon tax and to check a box than for a Canadian to earn a paycheque to be able to afford the basic necessities. In fact, the cost of his carbon tax is jeopardizing farm businesses; ultimately, this could further impact food security not only in our country but also across the world. This is why my Conservative colleague put forward a bill that would have removed the carbon tax that farmers pay on farm operations, for a cost savings of nearly a billion dollars by 2030. That is billion with a “b”. However, the Prime Minister leaned on the senators he appointed to gut that bill and to use every trick in the book to stop it. This impacts more than our farmers, because when we tax the farmer who grows the food, the trucker who ships the food, the processing facilities and the stores that sell the food, it is only common sense that the cost for Canadians to buy food goes up. The carbon tax scheme does not even end here. The NDP-Liberal coalition intends to quadruple the carbon tax. When I asked the Prime Minister to axe the carbon tax before it bankrupts all Canadians, his response demonstrated to Canadians how clearly out of touch the government is with reality. Its band-aid solutions to food security are useless when it is contributing much more significantly to the crisis at the same time. Its costly carbon tax is driving Canadians to food banks in record numbers. In fact, in just one month alone last year, Food Banks Canada reported two million visits. Lower prices on groceries and other basic necessities will give Canadians much-needed relief and relieve pressure on the many incredible food banks and charities that are oversubscribed across this country. The carbon tax-obsessed Prime Minister is simply not worth the cost. It is time to axe the carbon tax on everything permanently. In this way, we can lower prices for Canadians and start to address the affordability crisis in this country.

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Mr. Adam van Koeverden (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and to the Minister of Sport and Physical Activity, Lib.)

Jan/29/24 8:44:41 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I hate to start this way, but unfortunately I need to correct the member opposite. The claims that the carbon price is increasing the cost of living are categorically false. There is not one economist in this country who is pointing to carbon pricing, carbon taxing, pollution pricing or any variation of our plan to lower emissions by putting a price on pollution as what is causing inflation or causing a rise in the cost of living in Canada. We must be targeted in our approach to providing relief to families, because there is absolutely no question that things cost too much, particularly groceries. However, one of the previous speakers tonight pointed to the work of Dr. Sylvain Charlebois, who said that it would be false to point to any one factor, including carbon pricing, as the leading cause, the number one cause or the primary cause of food inflation in Canada. I will repeat that claims that the carbon price are increasing the cost of living are false. Most low- and medium-income households are actually far better off because of the way the system works. Our approach to carbon pricing is cost-neutral and sends cheques back to families four times a year, such that hundreds of dollars are back in the pockets of many families. The bulk of the proceeds from the price on carbon pollution go straight back into the pockets of Canadians in provinces where the fuel charge applies. That means that eight out of 10 households get more money back than they pay, on average. When Conservative members stand in the House and say to axe the tax, what they are actually saying is that we ought to take money out of the pockets of families that need it most. It is not as though our opinions matter more than math in this situation. We are allowed to have our own opinions but not our own facts. In this situation, it is simply mathematics. Calgary-based economist Trevor Tombe has done the math for us, indicating that pricing carbon in this country is not a leading cause of inflation and not a leading cause of the challenges Canadians are facing at the grocery store. I am committed to lowering grocery prices. I am committed to lowering inflation and to making sure that families can afford healthy food at the grocery store, and that is why I will say once again that eight out of 10 households get more money back than they pay. Conservatives have continually said that Liberals are obsessed with the carbon tax. We are not the ones asking questions about it every single day. We have done the math, and it works. Our emissions are coming down, and eight out of 10 families, including almost all of them on the bottom three quintiles of the income scale, are better off. We are also not quadrupling the carbon price this year; that is just plain misinformation. The fuel charge is a slow, steady increase in the cost of pollution, and it is designed to increase by $15 per tonne of pollution each year, which works out to about three cents on a litre of gas. Gas prices go up and down by 10%, 15% or 25% throughout the year, and we do not see that having an impact on groceries. When gas prices are up around $1.50 or $1.60, we see oil and gas companies profit as a result, and we do not see Conservatives stand in the House telling oil and gas companies to lower their prices because they are having an impact on the pocketbooks of Canadians. However, when we price carbon and send the money back to Canadian families, they are up in arms. The Governor of the Bank of Canada has recognized that putting a price on pollution is contributing less than 0.2% to inflation each year. As I have said, because of our quarterly climate action incentive payments, the vast majority of low- and middle-income households are getting more back than they are paying in the carbon tax every single year. That is four times a year. Recently, at the beginning of January, families received their first cheque.

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Mrs. Rosemarie Falk

Jan/29/24 8:48:51 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we know that the cost of everything is going up. I know that the parliamentary secretary said it is a slow and steady increase. It is a slow and steady increase on everything. Canadians pay the carbon tax on food, heat and fuel. These are basic necessities that Canadians need. The Liberals have doubled down and promised to increase the tax. The parliamentary secretary even said so: slow and steady. They have promised to continue to make life more unaffordable for all Canadians: farmers, first nations, families, everybody. Why is it that the member and his party are hell-bent on continuing to raise taxes, even if it may be slow and steady, to make life more and more unaffordable for Canadians?

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Mr. Adam van Koeverden

Jan/29/24 8:49:47 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, once again, the misinformation from the other side is concerning. Economists have confirmed over and over again that our climate plan is not responsible for recent inflation. It is math. It is not refutable. It is not as though my opinion matters more than facts. Facts matter. It is also true that we are not bankrupting any part of our economy. These claims are concerning and straight up wrong. We know that there are ways to make life more affordable for Canadians that do not ignore the reality of climate change and ways that will lead to potentially devastating costs further down the road. Our climate plan is working, emissions are coming down, and it is a very conservative approach to use a market-based instrument to lower emissions. I suspect that is probably why the Conservatives ran in their last campaign on a market-based instrument on pricing carbon. They did not win the last election. We did, so we were able to implement our plan. I am eager to hear what their climate action plan might be in the next election. I suspect it might be nothing.

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The Deputy Speaker

Jan/29/24 8:50:50 p.m.
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The motion that the House do now adjourn is deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m. pursuant to Standing Order 24(1). (The House adjourned at 8:53 p.m.)

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