If the Canadian Parliament had an annual fossil-of-the-year award, Colin Mayes would certainly be a strong candidate based on his views about climate change.
In his chat with the Market News (Jan. 6), he states that “the whole argument around greenhouse gas emissions and the changing climate… has collapsed.” Why, he asks, should Canada spend “billions of dollars just to find out it’s not greenhouse gas emissions” that are causing global warming?
One has to wonder where Mr. Mayes gets his information.
The International Panel on Climate Change, a body of scientists from around the world, has concluded that global warming is due to human-caused greenhouse gas emissions.
The US National Academy of Sciences states that every one of the leading national scientific academies worldwide has concluded that human activity is changing the climate. This is not just a ‘belief,’ they emphasized, but an objective evaluation of the scientific evidence.
Minister of the Environment, Peter Kent, appears to understand this, calling climate change a “disaster in the making.”
Yet Canada has withdrawn from the Kyoto Protocol, the only international agreement with binding targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Even the Harper government’s own weak target of reducing emissions to 17 per cent below 2005 levels by 2020 won’t be met, because of Canada’s current emission reduction policies.
The world has a small window of four to five years to put in place policies to avert runaway, uncontrollable climate change. Will Canada and the rest of the industrialized countries responsible for 75 per cent of the carbon currently in the atmosphere take leadership action for the security of Canadians and the world?
Or will our government continue to make the tar sands economy its priority focus, ignoring the real security threat that is facing Canadians: climate change?
Our representatives in Ottawa need to hear from us.
Email: colin.mayes@parl.gc.ca, peter.kent@parl.gc.ca
Anne Williams Morris
