The first step in addressing the interlinked challenges of climate and energy is to have a national policy. Canada’s federal government must engage in a constructive and respectful fashion with other orders of government – provincial/territorial, municipal, and First Nations to set an overarching set of policy targets.
Canada is the only industrialized nation with no energy policy. We are also the only industrialized country with no climate policy. We need both and we needed them a decade ago. But a decade ago, many provinces, particularly Alberta, rejected any talk of a national energy policy. The legacy of ill will from the Pierre Trudeau NEP meant that politicians feared using the words ‘energy’ and ‘national’ in the same sentence.
Green Party MPs will press for the establishment of national goals.
Shifting away from dependence on fossil fuels by embedding an aggressive climate action plan within our energy policy.
The following sections detail what the federal government can do.