Via CBC News, what a great irony for Climategate day:
Senate kills climate change bill
Last Updated: Wednesday, November 17, 2010
The Canadian Press
Senators have voted down an opposition bill to tackle climate change with just days to go before another round of United Nations talks in Mexico.
NDP Leader Jack Layton, whose party introduced the bill, says it’s “outrageous” an unelected Senate can kill what he says is important legislation.
The bill — the Climate Change Accountability Act — has spent the last year or so bouncing between the full House of Commons and its environment committee. The vote was late Tuesday.
The legislation calls for greenhouse gases to be cut 25 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020.
That’s more stringent than the Harper government’s goal of a 17 per cent emissions cut from 2005 levels by 2020, which is in line with the Obama administration’s targets in the United States.
Delegates from nearly 200 countries will meet in the resort town of Cancun later this month and try to broker an international climate-change deal.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/11/17/senate-climate-bill.html#ixzz15Z4F3lHv
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h/t to a bunch of people who read WUWT, so many I couldn’t choose who to credit with a hat tip, soo I’ll hat tip you all.
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Excellent! Now the list of usual suspects are going to have to figure out how to try to come up with a deal at Cancun knowing that the US, Canada, and France have already opted out. Oh, and China and India were out in any practical sense long ago.
So who’s going to volunteer to destroy their economies and give up all their jobs in order to benefit these countries which are thumbing their noses at the rest of them?
No one, that’s who.
And this is how the international climate movement dies. It was always an all or none type of proposition; now that it definitely is not “all”, the only rational option left is “none”.
A proud day to be Canadian!!!
Well maybe some common sense is coming to the MPs of Canada. Now maybe they will look at the message with an open mind instead of the group think that is AGW!
I love it. Whenever the Senate does something the lefties like, it’s “Canada’s upper house of sober second thought.” When they do something the lefties hate, it’s “that unelected rabble of Harper-appointed thugs.”
As a Canadian, I’m simply astonished that we managed to dodge another NDP-generated bullet on this ridiculous non-issue. Given how thoroughly Parliament is dominated by AGW true-believers and dyed-in-the-wool nanny-staters who reflexively vote in favour of every possible tax increase, spending increase, and expansion of government, I can’t believe this happened.
Maybe the Liberals and the Dippers are right. Maybe Harper IS an evil genius.
FYI, what was voted down (THE CLIMATE CHANGE ACCOUNTABILITY ACT), began with:
Recognizing that
-climate change poses a serious threat to the economic well-being, public health, natural resources and environment of Canada;
-the impacts of climate change are already unfolding in Canada, particularly in the Arctic;
-scientific research on the impacts of climate change has led to broad agreement that an increase in the global average surface temperature of two degrees Celsius or more above the level prevailing at the start of the industrial period would constitute dangerous climate change;
-scientific research has also identified the atmospheric concentration levels at which greenhouse gases must be stabilized in order to stay within two degrees of global warming and thereby prevent dangerous climate change; and
-this legislation is intended to ensure that Canada reduces greenhouse gas emissions to an extent similar to that required by all industri- alized countries in order to prevent dangerous climate change, in accordance with the scientific evidence on the impacts of increased levels of global average surface temperature and the corresponding levels of atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases;
The act would have restricted:
(a) carbon dioxide, which has the molecular formula CO2;
(b) methane, which has the molecular formula CH4;
(c) nitrous oxide, which has the molecular formula N2O;
(d) hydridofluoridocarbon that have the molecular formula CnHxF(2n+2-x) in which 0<n<6;
(e) the following perfluorinated hydrocarbon:
(i) those that have the molecular formula CnF2n+2 in which 0<n<7, and
(ii) octafluorocyclobutane, which has the molecular formula C4F8; and
(f) sulphur hexafluoride, which has the molecular formula SF6.
The Government would have been committed to:
The Government of Canada shall ensure that Canadian greenhouse gas emissions are reduced, subject to the ultimate objectives of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change,
(a) as a long-term target, to a level that is 80% below the 1990 level by the year 2050; and
(b) as a medium-term target, valid prior to the target plan referred to in subsection 6(1), to a level that is 25% below the 1990 level by the year 2020.
In a nutshell, it was a repudiation of the UN, and, with the collapse of the Chicago Carbon Market, the senators put the final nail in the coffin of the Act since the trading of offsets was key to making this thing work. Domino #1?
Canada has more than enough; land, fresh water, oil, coal, gas, food, timber, iron, uranium, rare-earths and climate regions and a very un-European and un-American government deficit.
Canada does not need to take its marching orders from the UN, the EU or China.
Canada does not owe any of them anything.
Canada is in a position to think and act independently, so it does.
While I agree with the defeat of the bill I will point out that the bill got to the Senate after it was approved by a majority of MP’s in parliment. A proud day indeed. Only the readers of the Toronto Star and Mr Layton’s supporters (leader of the party responsible for the introduction of the bill) will be gnashing their collective teeth – I hear the grinding now:)
Maybe, just maybe, we Canadians have some senators with wisdom!
Good on ya!
If Cancun fails then I believe that this will be the beginning of the end. India and China would be nuts to opt into Cancun after seeing what has happened in US, Canada, and France.
Won’t take long now before every country is running for the emergency exit.
Cancun might be the scene of a complete stampede 🙂
interesting the bill was worked on for 5 years by the Sierra Club
/Mango
Who’s left to go to Cancun..?
The UK of course..!
Haven’t you heard..? We’re going to reduce our CO2 emissions by 80% (thats EIGHTY percent) by 2050…
So – we’re going to cover our beautiful landscape with wind turbines (an area the size of Wales is required, apparently) – close all the power stations which the EU don’t like – and all this while still insisting that any new nuclear power stations are fully privately funded (unlike the wind turbines mentioned above)…
Its a brilliant plan, isn’t it..??
Official English:
O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
Official French:
Terre de nos aïeux,
Ton front est ceint de fleurons glorieux!
Car ton bras sait porter l’épée,
Il sait porter la croix!
Ton histoire est une épopée
Des plus brillants exploits.
Et ta valeur, de foi trempée,
Protégera nos foyers et nos droits.
Protégera nos foyers et nos droits.
Today freer than it could have been. Still glorious.
YEAAA!!!
Those Senators woke up long enough to do something right. In terms of ROI, they just justified their salary for life!!!!
Well, as a Canadian too, I have little time for our senate in most cases. However, i’ll make an exception this time!!!
Sean Peake
Thanks for that. Gad – we dogded a bullet there. Thank goodness some of these people have some common sense.
Greek PM Says it at Last: Carbon Taxes are Just Another Way to Raise Revenue
“George Papandreou, the Greek prime minister has said that there may need to be new Europe-wide forms of taxation to help pay for the bail-outs that will be needed by the growing number of crashing economies in the euro-zone. His suggestions include “carbon dioxide taxes” which, he says, could provide “important revenues and resources for funding such a [bail-out] mechanism.””
http://www.infowars.com/greek-pm-says-it-at-last-carbon-taxes-are-just-another-way-to-raise-revenue/
The good old US of A should take a lesson from these folks.
Huh, I really can’t say I saw this coming. This would have been the perfect opportunity for the liberal dominated senate to embararess the harper conservatives who are often acused of being “climate change deniers” (HELL YES I VOTE CONSERVATIVE!).
But it seems not all the liberal senators showed up for work – LMAO!!!
Well played!
Sha – ZAM!
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/tory-senators-kill-climate-bill-passed-by-house/article1802519/
No doubt the MSM is already lining up some synthetic outrage about this but harper has my full support on this.
I shall include a prayer of thanks for this great event.
Meanwhile what do I do about my own Parliament which voted virtually unanimously to cut CO2 emissions by 80% by 2050?
The Canadian Senate often does fine work. Sometimes they even get it right. This is one time they got it right but it is not the result of fine work. It is strictly a political response to the Prime Minister’s total failure to develop any kind of coherent policy on the subject. The bill they killed was not a government initiative but one from the opposition. The last thing PM Harper needed in Mexico is this kind of legislation making its way through the process. He has enough problems with credibility as it is.
All though I do not have full confidence in understanding the context of what this means in Canadian politics, it looks on the face of it to be good news. Congratulations Canadian skepticism and common sense.
John
Oh man! Now we will have to endure seeing Jack Layton and Elizabeth May on the news for quite some time… oh, The Humanity!
Some of the more strident alarmist projections show the tree line expanding all the way to the Arctic Ocean coast in Canada. Turning vast portions of their vast country, that are now essentially unusable, into productive acreage wouldn’t seem to be a trend that many Canadians would be willing contest with any fervor. If AGW does turn out to be real, Canada looks to be a major beneficiary.