Canada Climate-Change Stand Spurs Election Talk
Date: 01-Nov-06
Country: CANADA
Author: Randall Palmer
The small left-leaning New Democratic Party left open the possibility on Tuesday that it would use Thursday, when it is entitled to set the agenda of the House of Commons, to move that Parliament had lost confidence in the government because of what opposition parties say is inaction on global warming.
"All of the options are available to us," NDP leader Jack Layton said at a news conference when asked about the possibility of introducing a confidence motion.
He said he would decide what motion Parliament would debate after holding a rare meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper on Tuesday afternoon, where he will try to persuade Harper to toughen up the Conservatives' climate-change policy.
Since the Conservatives, elected in January, have only 124 of the 308 seats in the House of Commons, the government is always vulnerable to being defeated on a confidence motion.
If such a motion were to pass, the country would head into its third national election in 2-1/2 years, but analysts said this was unlikely.
The motion would have to have the support of the Liberals, the biggest opposition party. But the Liberals gave Layton's idea a cool reception in light of the fact that they are gearing up to choose a new party leader in December and would not want to enter a federal campaign without their new chief.
"We don't vote for stunts," one Liberal official said.
Layton also introduced a bill on Tuesday that would require greenhouse gas emissions to be cut by 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050, but this also met a hostile reaction.
Gilles Duceppe -- head of the only other opposition party, the Bloc Quebecois -- told reporters he did not think the NDP knew what it was doing and called the bill a "diversion".
The opposition parties have signaled they would most likely vote to topple the government next spring over its budget.
Harper's government introduced its Clean Air Act two weeks ago to reduce air pollution and limit emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane, which are blamed for global warming.
But all three opposition parties -- the Liberals, the NDP and the Bloc Quebecois -- said they would vote against it because it would not act quickly enough on climate change.
Defeat of the legislation would not automatically trigger an election but it could mean gridlock on the environment.
Layton challenged Harper in Parliament on Monday to meet him to try to find common ground on the issue. Harper agreed.
"We ... have to find some way forward, using compromise, using consensus, using creativity, thinking outside the box, listening to each other perhaps a little bit more than typically goes on, and trying to come up with a path that can be formed into legislation that would actually pass this House of Commons," Layton said ahead of the meeting.
Canada is a signatory to the Kyoto Protocol on reducing greenhouse has emissions but the Conservatives say the country cannot meet the treaty's goals.
(Additional reporting by David Ljunggren)