Ottawa's Kyoto plan under fire on all sides [Canada]

OTTAWA - Canada's major environmental groups have turned against the federal government over a controversial Kyoto budget measure, increasing the pressure on the Liberals to back down and avoid a showdown with the Conservatives that could lead to a spring election.

The NDP and Bloc Québécois have already pledged to vote against the budget bill. Last week, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper also vowed to vote against it unless the environmental provision is removed.

Yesterday, eight environmental groups issued a joint statement saying the provision — which would allow Ottawa to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act — is creating an "unnecessary and divisive" debate.

The groups found themselves in unlikely agreement with the oil industry, which also criticized the government's approach yesterday, saying it cuts short the debate on Kyoto implementation.

The government survived previous budget votes this year thanks to abstentions from Conservative MPs, but that option now appears unlikely, creating a situation in which one of the two parties must back down in order to avoid an election.

Although they had originally promised not to bring down the government over the budget, the Conservatives say the new environmental measures came as a surprise and amount to an undemocratic way of introducing wide-ranging regulations that could ultimately see huge costs passed on to consumers.

NDP Leader Jack Layton went so far as to question the Liberals' motivation for the amendment.

"You've got to wonder, are they trying to precipitate an election?" said Mr. Layton, accusing the government of engineering a "false crisis" over the bill.

At issue are a series of changes contained in budget legislation that remove all references to the word "toxic" from the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. That would broaden the substances that could be regulated under that law to include carbon dioxide.

The environmental groups, which include the Sierra Legal Defence Fund, Greenpeace and the David Suzuki Foundation, say CEPA's current definition of a toxic substance is already broad enough to include the carbon dioxide in greenhouse gas.

The groups express concern that the environmental amendments are being proposed without any debate and will undermine the five-year review of the act that is currently taking place.

"What the government is doing is not supported by environmental leaders in Canada, so it begs the question as to why they're doing it," said Rick Smith of the Environmental Defence Fund, which issued the statement along with the Canadian Environmental Law Association, the Pembina Institute, Great Lakes United and Pollution Probe.

Prior to the criticism from the environmental groups, some Liberals had suggested their party could portray itself as the defender of the environment should the Conservatives follow through on their threat to vote against the budget bill and defeat the government.

Mr. Harper said last week that if the CEPA provisions are not removed from the budget implementation bill, "well, then, we'll have an election."

Tory House Leader Jay Hill said yesterday the Liberals should now split the budget bill into two separate pieces of legislation.

Mr. Layton agreed with the position of the environmental groups and said the Liberals should have realized that environmental measures could be passed separately with the support of his party and the Bloc. The NDP Leader, who is also his party's environment critic, said the Liberals' current approach could have unintended consequences.

"What about if by making this change in a rush with no public hearings and no expert testimony to fine-tune it, we end up making it easier to pollute with some other toxins? This is what's really troubling about it," he said.

André Lamarre, a spokesman for Environment Minister Stéphane Dion, dismissed as "ridiculous" Mr. Layton's accusations that the Liberals might intend to force an election on the issue.

"The reason why we're doing it is because it makes more sense," Mr. Lamarre said. The spokesman said the minister disagrees with the concerns of the environmentalists and there are currently no plans to remove the provisions from the bill.

The House of Commons is on recess until next week, but the first day of debate on the budget bill is not expected until the following week. The timing of the first vote on the bill will depend on the number of MPs wishing to debate it at second reading.

The oil and gas industry opposes the move as a piecemeal approach, saying the Liberals are giving themselves the power to enforce Kyoto without spelling out their plan to reduce greenhouse gases or writing into law the various assurances they have relayed to industry.

Conservative environment critic Bob Mills said the criticism from environmentalists "shows how the government is just grasping at straws."

He said the government should bring its Kyoto plan separately for a full debate.With a report from Patrick Brethour

SO the Liberal government is going to remove the word "toxic" from their environmental regulations. For example, the phrase "regulation of toxic chemicals" will be simply "regulation of chemicals." Without the word toxic, then ANYTHING can be arbitrarily regulated by the Canadian Govenrment, including carbon dioxide. This is a move to implement Kyoto without debate, and, as many of you can imagine, will have all kinds of back door loop holes for other regulation. If the Liberals try this, there will be an election in Canada, and the Liberals will likely win again, with another minority I predict. Canadians just can't change their voting habits and are too dumb to know how Kyoto will screw them over royally. That is spoken from an ex-patriot.

I understand that all too well. When I was in school, students complained that it was unfair I was awarded scholarships for graduate studies because I was top of my class. The other students thought the scholarship money should be divided equally amongst all the students to make it fair and to make higher educationm more affordable to everyone. To them, doing well meant nothing except making everone else look bad. That's why I wanted to move to the U.S. - an entirely opposite attitude.

Add this little poison pill to the mix ...

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper's threats to vote against a Liberal money bill jeopardizes an offshore revenue deal worth billions of dollars to Atlantic Canada, says a federal cabinet minister.

Harper has suggested his party would vote against Bill C-43, claiming it contains provisions that would give the Liberals "unlimited power to implement the Kyoto (treaty) without ever bringing a plan to Parliament."

However, Geoff Regan, the Nova Scotia representative in the federal cabinet, said if the Conservatives defeat the budget bill, a revenue-sharing deal that took months to negotiate will also disappear.

Part 12 of Bill C-43 authorizes Parliament to provide Nova Scotia with $1.1 billion, while delivering an estimated $2.6 billion into Newfoundland's coffers over eight years.

Prime Minister Paul Martin promised during the June election to renegotiate a deal to shield offshore revenues from equalization clawbacks, but it took seven months to reach agreements with the two provinces.

Link: Minister says offshore deal threatened

The liberals are attempting to make Harper and the Conservatives appear anti-Atlantic Provinces. I hope that Maritimers and NFers will see through this and that Harper addresses this particular issue. He needs the support of the East Coast and the East Coast needs to open its eyes.

It's shameful how desperate the Fiberals are for votes...and they know that they cannot depend on Ontario as a result of the same-sex marriage fiasco (the Greater Toronto Area's 45 seats is not enough for them now), meaning they are doing everything to attract the Atlantic voters, even through demonizing opponents.

Watch them do scare tactics at both the Conservatives and the NDP...

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