Senator Dagenais: Leader, can you explain how a government that is totally incapable of issuing passports will be able to organize COP15 in just three months, a job that normally takes two years? I hope we won’t have to be calling on those same people who are now working on issuing passports.

Hon. Jean-Guy Dagenais: My question is for the Leader of the Government in the Senate. Leader, friends of your Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Steven Guilbeault, agree that the aviation industry’s carbon emissions are responsible for 5% to 6% of global warming and that pollution generated by global aviation increases 3% to 4% per year.

The government that you represent never ceases to amaze me with its inconsistent and illogical decisions, as I will explain.

Leader, I would like to know why the Trudeau government will spend no less than $64 million to host, next October, COP15, the United Nations conference on biodiversity, which was to be held in China. It will turn 12,000 to 15,000 environmentalists into global polluters, who are coming from 190 different countries to see Canadian achievements in biodiversity, which could easily be presented on digital platforms.

How can anyone justify such a contradiction on the part of environmentalists, who are shirking their responsibilities in the fight against greenhouse gas emissions?