Environment Commissioner slams Harperites

More of the same on the Hill: eco-wars, pork and public service crisis.

by Ish Theilheimer

and Samantha Bayard with YouTube video

OTTAWA, Straight Goods News May 14, 2012 — The government handed out a few plums, it was slammed by another official report (environment), and it went on the defensive over search-and-rescue services and ministerial perks.

Environment Commissioner Scott Vaughan's spring report criticized the Harper government for withdrawing from the Kyoto Protocol, for not projecting the costs of its own climate change plan, and for its lack of action in containing contaminated sites across Canada.

It was Vaughan's final report under the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act. Although he government announced last December that Canada is withdrawing from Kyoto, Canada is still legally required to report on its 2011 climate change plan, which includes a target of lowering greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent.

NDP environment critic Megan Leslie criticized the government's inaction and accounting lapses, which she found striking in light of recent cuts to environmental assessment.

"Last December Environment Minister Peter Kent claimed that meeting Canada's obligations on the Kyoto Protocol would cost nearly $14 Billion. He told Canadians that protecting our future was just too costly to the economy. But the Conservatives have no idea what the cost of their own plan will be.

"If Kyoto costs too much, it would stand to reason that there would be an economic analysis of what their plan was. But we don't have one," said Megan Leslie. "When the Minister of the Environment came forward with his press conference about pulling out of Kyoto he was fear-mongering."

Scott Vaughan doubts the government will meet its new targets either: "Environment Canada's own forecast shows that in 2020, Canada's emissions will be 7 percent above the 2005 level, not 17 percent below it… we doubt that there is enough time to achieve the 2020 target," said Vaughan.

The rest of the report focused on federal contaminated sites and their impacts. "We found that the government has made progress in identifying some 22,000 contaminated sites across the country. To date the government reports that nearly half the contaminated sites are closed. It is unclear how the thousands of other sites will be managed," said Vaughan.

Environment Commissioner Scott Vaughan outlines his Spring 2012 report

"Many of these contaminations could have been prevented with proper environmental assessment," said Megan Leslie. Many of these sites are nearby or within cities like Montreal and Ottawa. "People could be living beside these contaminated sites without even knowing," she said. "How can there be 50 contaminated sites right here? Where are they? Do we know? Are they in our backyards?"

The NDP's Megan Leslie responds to the Environment Commissioner's report.

This week, news surfaced that the government has hired a private lawyer, costing taxpayers more than a million dollars, to represent Stephen Harper in a lawsuit brought by former cabinet minister Helena Guergis. The NDP's Charlie Angus (Timmins-James Bay) was blunt about this use of public funds.

"I don't know anyone in the private sector that has a sign on their door that says specialist in Parliamentary law, when we have a whole department that does it. What we've seen again and again is the secrecy of this government. The fact that they're using taxpayers dollars like they are Versailles kings," said Angus.

Charlie Angus on lawyers and sponsorship

As Tom Mulcair and the NDP rise in the polls (leading by four points in one survey), the Conservatives fought back. Natural resources minister Joe Oliver echoed recent comments from Saskatchewan's premier Brad Wall attacking Mulcair for saying the oil boom is driving up the Canadian economy, killing industrial jobs with so-called "Dutch disease."

Natural resources minister Joe Oliver attacks the NDP's Tom Muclair.

The NDP did some fighting back of its own, revealing a strategy to fight the omnibus budget bill last Thursday. New Democrats plan on putting 20 motions through to committee in an effort to force the government to break the bill down into components for more detailed debate and public examination.

"This is about being transparent and accountable to the Canadian people" said NDP House leader Nathan Cullen. "It's about the public having an opportunity to have an understanding of the largest omnibus bill in Canadian History."

Nathan Cullen calls for the government to break up the omnibus Budget bill.

One of the many victims of the cuts is the CBC, where professionals and technicians at every level will be losing work and, in many cases, leaving Canada. NDP culture critic and Juno award winning singer/ songwriter Andrew Cash spoke with Straight Goods News about his concerns. "We need to create an arts economy here in Canada that's vibrant and exciting and keeps our Canadian artists here, creating here," said Cash. "Because they see this is where the action is, this is where the opportunity is, this is the best springboard for their career."

Musician-turned-MP Andrew Cash sees culture as an important part of the economy.

Debate in Parliament reflected the fury on Canada's East Coast over an apparent crisis in federal search-and-rescue operations and how this contributed to the failure last winter to rescue 14-year-old Burton Winters of Makkovik, Labrador. "News broke Tuesday that medical calls for help from ships off Newfoundland and Labrador, and only off Newfoundland and Labrador, were being routed 5,000 miles away to Italy," the NDP's Ryan Cleary (St John's SouthMount Pearl, NDP) told the House. "The calls were being directed to a Rome-based non-profit organization that has been described as 'the soup kitchen of telehelp."

Apparently radio operators in Rome didn't know where Newfoundland was.

"The government is in crisis mode, it's paralyzed," said Scott Simms, Liberal MP.

Proving that some things never change, another defeated Conservative candidate, former Cabinet minister Lawrence Cannon, got one of the sweetest of patronage picks, being appointed Ambassador to France.

Foreign affairs minister John Baird gave a rare media scrum to announce the appointment.

In other news this week:

• Legal experts, front-line workers and refugees spoke for a week to a committee examining the proposed refugee bill, C-31, The NDP is asking the Conservatives to revise their proposals. "Witness after witness has told the committee that C-31 is fundamentally flawed," said the NDP's Jinny Sims (Newton-North Delta). "This bill centralizes power in the hands of the minister while punishing refugees and won't address the problem of human smuggling."

   

• Defence minister Peter MacKay found himself defending lowball estimates for military spending again. In this case, the question was last year's Libya mission. In June of last year, MacKay said the incremental cost of the Libya mission from March 2011 to the end of September would be approximately $60 million. Figures in the government's Report on Plans and Priorities, published this week, show that the actual incremental cost of the mission was $99.8 million. Worse still, the reported costs of the entire mission skyrocketed to $350 million with the release of figures buried in a DND report tabled in the House of Commons last Tuesday.

   

• On Monday, foreign minister John Baird boasted to the House that the Harper government cuts have been expressly ideological, and that the government won't pay for advice with which it doesn't agree. When interim Liberal leader Bob Rae asked about the cutting of funds to the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy (NRTEE) under the federal budget, Baird was defiant. Although NRTEE is an independent agency set up by the Mulroney Conservatives to integrate environmental and economic advice, Baird blasted it, saying it " …has tabled more than 10 reports encouraging a carbon tax. Now we know why the Liberal Party holds that organization so dear, because the Liberals truly want to bring in a carbon tax on every family in this country. Well, those of us on this side of the House will not let them do it."

© Copyright 2012 Ish Theilheimer and Samantha Bayard, All rights Reserved. Written For: StraightGoods.ca