In the midst of Canada's Environment Week, the country is experiencing wildfires from coast to coast. For the first time ever, Ottawa is experiencing reduced air quality from climate induced fire and smoke.
"Even inside the chamber, we can taste the acrid smoky air, as Minister for Families Karina Gould noted in debate on Tuesday. CBC's Aaron Wherry nailed it 'Parliament fiddles while Canada burns,'" said Elizabeth May, Green Party leader (MP Saanich-Gulf Islands). "It has been four years since the House passed the motion that we are in a climate emergency, but for the first time since that moment, parliament itself is experiencing the surrealistic dystopian skies British Columbians have been seeing every summer since 2017."
"Canada is on fire and people across the country are experiencing climate impacts first-hand," said Mike Morrice (MP Kitchener Centre). "How can the governing party say we're in a climate emergency, and at the same time they continue to subsidize the fossil fuel industry and approve new oil and gas projects? These fires should be a wake up call - we don't need more talk, we need urgent climate action that meets the scale of the challenges we're facing."
Deputy Leader Jonathan Pedneault, currently campaigning in the federal by-election in Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Westmount, said "No other party is talking about the climate crisis in four by-elections in three provinces. With extreme conditions from floods, to fires to heat waves
across Canada, our parliamentarians provide a real-time example of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres description of 'moral and economic madness.'"
"We need real climate action and we need an enormous investment in resilience and adaptation - and we need both yesterday," said Elizabeth May. "It is not too late to avoid levels of climate crisis to which we can no longer adapt. "
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