Editor:
We are all trying to process the alarming warning from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that we’re in the midst of a “code red” climate crisis.
Canada’s governments have all said they are taking this warning very seriously. But the question is: what are they going to do in response to it? Given their past records, I believe it’s important that we stand up and press them for concrete answers.
In Ottawa, the Trudeau government came into power promising a green energy solution and an end to fossil fuel subsidies. It then promptly spent tens of billions of dollars on Keystone, Trans Mountain and other oil pipelines, projects that the industry itself had found to be too risky.
In B.C., Premier Horgan’s government continued most of his predecessor’s destructive environmental practices, including exporting more coal and more timber than the rest of Canada combined. And with the Trans Mountain Pipeline, we may soon see a daily parade of oil tankers sailing from Burrard Inlet.
The apocalyptic nature of the IPCC’s warning ought to persuade our governments to change from being polluters of the environment to becoming its protectors. I sincerely hope they will pay more than just lip service to it. Our MLA, Nicholas Simons, in his June 18 letter to the Coast Reporter, promised that the government will soon announce new protections to our forests. Such an announcement would be a step in the right direction. And it would be popular here on the Coast, as attested by the crowds who’ve been turning out for this summer’s series of Endangered Forests Hikes.
As we see what’s happening to the environment around us, we have no choice but to count on our governments to do whatever has to be done to protect that environment.
Robert O’Neill, Roberts Creek
