Therefore, honourable senators, in amendment, I move:

That Bill C-234 be not now read a third time, but that it be amended,

(a) in clause 1,

(i) on page 1, by replacing lines 4 to 15 with the following:

“1 (1) Paragraph (c) of the definition eligible farming machinery in section 3 of the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act is replaced by the”,

(ii) on page 2, by deleting lines 1 to 10;

(b) in clause 2, on page 2, by replacing line 22 with the following:

“2 (1) Subsections 1(2.1) and (5) come”.

It will be easier to read on a piece of paper but will look as technical as what I just said, but this is the translation in legislative terms of what I have said.

It means creating a carve-out in that bill to remove heating and cooling of barns and other farm buildings because it makes no sense and because human lives are not exempted, except in the very limited case of home heating oil, and therefore the logic is not there. If we are ready to legislate on false premises and in an illogical way because we fear the pressure from farmers, because we fear the threats from people, I say we will then abdicate our responsibility, and this Senate will not be the new Senate. It will be back to the old days, when nobody cared about the Senate.

Senator Dalphond, the time for debate has expired. Are you prepared to take questions?

I would have thought that after 45 minutes everybody had enough of me. If you want five more minutes, I am willing to ask for it.

Is leave granted?

Honourable senators, first of all, let me start off by saying I’m not sure what grain farmers are doing in downtown Montreal, but in Western Canada they are still drying their grain. I’m not sure where Senator Dalphond gets this that the drying season is over. The drying season is far from over in my province of Manitoba, in Saskatchewan, Alberta and, I’m sure, Ontario.

Senator Dalphond also said that this is a vanguard attempt to axe the tax. Now if that were so, then I wonder why the Green Party, the NDP and the Bloc supported this bill in the other place. I don’t think Senator Dalphond would accuse the Green Party of wanting to axe the tax. So this is across party lines.

I’m going to be very brief. Senator Dalphond also talked about how farmers are so efficient they are now using NECO grain dryers, and he is correct. What Senator Dalphond didn’t say is that NECO grain dryers use propane to heat. I’m not sure why if a farmer is becoming more efficient and using 30% less energy, we wouldn’t say, hallelujah, that’s a great thing, and he is going to need less of an exemption because he is using less? We should cheer them on, not try to penalize them.

So I really am a little baffled at his arguments. But most of all, colleagues, how many votes do we need to take on the same issue before Senator Dalphond says, “Maybe they want this”? We voted on this very same amendment. I’m sure if I would use that as a point of order, Senator Dalphond might find a comma that is different in his than it was in the other, so I won’t raise a point of order on that, Your Honour, although I firmly believe that an argument could be made for a point of order that this very same amendment was dealt with in this chamber.

Senator Dalphond moved this amendment in committee, and then we voted on the committee report that had that amendment in it. This chamber decided to reject that amendment by rejecting the committee report. I don’t know how we could be any clearer than that.

When that wasn’t good enough, Senator Dalphond, I’m sure, had some input in deciding the next amendment that we voted on earlier this evening. Again, that amendment was rejected by us in this chamber. Democratically, we rejected that amendment. Now Senator Dalphond is putting forward another amendment that is exactly the same, and I hear there is a third amendment waiting in the wings.

Colleagues, how often? Farmers from coast to coast to coast are pleading with us. Even if grain dryers are more efficient, Senator Dalphond, there are people who are heating, and that season is starting now, not ending. Even though you already falsely said we’re not drying grain anymore, the heating season is starting now. This is when those farmers are going to have their cause.

This isn’t farmers in one part of Canada. This isn’t just farmers in Atlantic Canada or in Western Canada. Quebec farmers, even though they have the cap-and-trade system in Quebec, are pleading for us to treat everybody fairly, reject amendments and pass Bill C-234. That is in Senator Dalphond’s own province, but somehow Senator Dalphond knows better than all the farmers in his own province. These are dairy farmers, hog farmers, grain farmers and vegetable growers. They all want us to pass Bill C-234 unamended.

Colleagues, this is again an amendment that, I repeat, I believe is very close to warranting a point of order, but I won’t do that. I will count on senators to do what they did earlier today and show Senator Dalphond again that the majority of senators want this passed, and they want it passed unamended. Twice we voted on that, colleagues.

I know the government is anxious, and I know they are working hard, even though they never get involved in private members’ bills, unless it comes to one they don’t like. Colleagues, let’s reject this. Let’s move on. Let’s give Canadian farmers what they need. Let’s give them some certainty so they know they will be able to dry their grain and heat their barns. They will get more efficient grain dryers, Senator Dalphond. If they are available, trust me, they will get them. It’s a benefit to them as well as it is to the rest of the country. They are not trying to operate inefficiently; they are trying to operate as efficiently as is physically possible.

Colleagues, please, I encourage you to reject this amendment and support farmers from every region of this country. Support farmers — vote against this amendment. This is a delay tactic. That is absolutely all it is, a delay tactic like we have never seen before. Colleagues, vote against this amendment. With that, I would like to call the question.

Senator Plett, Senator Ringuette has a question. Will you accept a question?

No.

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak on Senator Dalphond’s amendment to Bill C-234. Actually, as you can see, my pile of research is getting higher and higher.

For me, this amendment represents a compromise to moving this bill forward and accepting a certain time frame for grain farmers to purchase cleaner technology — grain dryers — that is now available in the marketplace. In fact, for many years, the Department of Agriculture has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to help grain farmers purchase such energy-efficient dryers.

I will also say that this bill is not an issue of fairness for farmers, since I have already proven to you via the PBO — Parliamentary Budget Officer — report that with the current exemption of 97% for diesel and gas, the net average cost to farmers per year, per farm, is $806, and that’s the average for the next seven years. What you get is the current pricing on propane and natural gas, including the 90% rebate. Read the PBO report. Stop taking for granted this one issue of everyone who is in favour of this bill saying that it’s a billion dollars. It is not. Read the PBO report.

The current carbon pricing scheme is the most generous of all carbon schemes, more generous than carbon pricing for individuals — consumers — and more generous than the private scheme for any other economic sector in this country.

This bill is not about fairness for farmers. After the events we witnessed during our break week, I reaffirm that this is a Trojan Horse for those who want to axe the tax. During our break week, while I was doing research, I was constantly on the phone with our regional potato farmers objectively explaining the current 97% exemption for diesel and gas and the 90% rebate for farmers. Most of them did not know about this rebate because New Brunswick has been on the federal program only since July 1.

I also objectively informed them about Bill C-234, which would remove carbon pricing on propane and natural gas, including that it would eventually and very shortly, colleagues — let’s be realistic — also remove any rebate, since the rebate is based on 90% of the proceeds. It will remove the rebates that the farmers receive. That’s the other half of the story you have not heard.

It was very clear after analyzing their cost spreadsheet that the current scheme is financially better for them. At the same time, they express how much climate change is continuously affecting their operations. They see the long-term cost benefit of reducing emissions. Being as down-to-earth as they are in my area, they want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem. They do not want to be the biggest outlier on carbon pricing compared to any other business. They are proud farmers. They also do not want to be the political scapegoat of the partisan rhetoric we’re hearing now.

By the way, these are the same family farmers who, during the drought in the West a few decades ago, even though they were poor farmers, sent trainloads of free potatoes to our Western Canadians. They believe, like on most issues, that we are all in this together.

I did not tell them yet about the double-talk of the lobbyists who they are paying for to lobby on this bill. It’s their hard-earned money, and there is double-talk at the same time. Even Senator Plett has confirmed that. Farm organizations and beef organizations were in his office saying, “You need to support this bill, but please, do not help the supply management farmers of Canada.” I have some of those in my area, and they will know about this.

During these conversations, they informed me that climate change requires them to increase the amount of fertilizer they need and that fertilizer costs have drastically increased because of the embargo on Russia. These cost elements were never discussed in Agriculture Committee meetings.

I must admit that it was quite a revelation to me, so I did some research, although I could not find the cost increase for fertilizer due to our Russian embargo, which is probably much higher than what we’re talking about today. I did find, though, a study issued this October about Saskatchewan farmers’ emissions that indicates the following in the last 20 years: Greenhouse gas, or GHG, emissions from Saskatchewan agriculture and production of agricultural inputs are steadily rising. Emissions have doubled. The tonnage — and that’s where the real cost is — of nitrogen fertilizer applied annually has quadrupled in Saskatchewan. So I can imagine that the cost has quadrupled accordingly but not because of carbon pricing.

Going back to the cost increase for fertilizer caused by the embargo on Russia, this is a measure that we all applauded in this chamber and in the other place. We applauded the embargo on Russia because of the war they are waging in Ukraine. In fact, when we were at the other place to hear President Zelenskyy, a senator dressed in her Ukrainian outfit sitting next to me clapped quite a lot louder than me, and honestly it warmed my heart.

It seems that support, though, has cooled down, and quite a lot. I wonder how last week some managed to turn their backs on Ukraine with 109 Conservative MPs voting against the Ukraine-Canada trade agreement based on this phobia of carbon pricing. It’s a phobia. It’s nothing else. Honourable senators, Ukraine has had carbon pricing since 2011, more than a decade before us. In fact, it was that same year that the Harper government withdrew Canada from the Kyoto Protocol. The leader of the time described it as a socialist scheme. We were the only country in the world to repudiate the Kyoto Protocol.

Contrary to the lessons we should have learned from our past mistake on this issue, some senators who were here then and are still here now have almost the same arguments but disguised in slightly different packaging.

The package in front of us is an accessory, the continuous arguments of doing nothing. The bill unamended is exactly that — doing nothing — even though our farming sector is the fifth-largest Canadian emitter of greenhouse gases.

An important unintended consequence of this bill is that by its removal of 100% of carbon pricing, it will have disastrous implications regarding trade agreements. The consequence of this bill is greater than meets the eye. Canada is a trading nation. We do not live in isolation. The entire world is waging war against emissions, and so are the countries that we have and want to have trade agreements with. All future and current Canada trade agreements will include, whether we like it or not, provisions with regard to sectorial emissions reductions.

We will not be able to bypass emissions reductions in trade negotiations. Canada is the fifth-largest exporter of food products: 50% of our beef, 70% of soybeans, 70% of pork, 75% of wheat, 90% of our canola, and the list goes on. How do you think our farmers will fare in any future trade agreements for their products without any emission pricing, given a competitive world? Do you honestly believe our trading partners, who all have carbon pricing, will not consider your proposed 100% exemption for farmers?

There will be retaliation, and it will be real and costly, particularly for the farmers from Quebec and B.C., who will take a double hit in regard to carbon pricing and trade because Canada’s trade agreements will not be able to differentiate what is happening on the farms in Quebec and B.C. That situation is not there.

If you do not believe that, honestly, you are dreaming in Technicolor. There is no way our trading partners will accept the exclusion of our entire agriculture economic sector from carbon emission regulation and carbon pricing. I can just imagine the retaliation.

As I said earlier, the current net average carbon pricing for farmers is established at $806 per farm per year over the next seven years. Future trade agreements without any carbon pricing for our farmers could cost millions, if not billions, of dollars to those farmers. I reiterate that it takes political guts and foresight to put in place in Canada a slate of policies to reduce emissions. So far, no one has had the guts to do that.

The entire world is moving in that direction. As the house of sober second thought, this is the reality we face with this bill. It is not, again, about farm fairness. It is so politically clear to me. Some say that by not acting sooner we have already killed the planet. I am a fighter; you can see. I’m a fighter for what is right, and I will not give up. Individually and collectively, we need to try harder and faster in regard to climate change and emissions.

I have supported this Agriculture Committee report that contained that amendment, and in the spirit of compromise —

Senator Ringuette, your time has expired.

May I have a few more minutes?

Is leave granted, honourable senators?

Honourable senators, I would first like to thank Senator Ringuette, Senator Plett and Senator Dalphond for their interventions. It’s a reminder of how important third reading debate is because tonight we have heard some new information that should help all of us come to a decision, not just on this amendment but the bill as a whole.

Senator Dalphond, in his closing remarks, admonished us to legislate based on facts. While all of us will have to decide what we believe are the facts, you may agree that we’ve heard information, from Senators Dalphond and Ringuette in particular, that does not correspond to the avalanche of information that lobby groups have bombarded us with.

Again, it’s up to all of us to decide which facts we choose, but I’m so grateful to my colleagues for providing us with some alternative viewpoints.

I am also very grateful for the opportunity to join debate on this amendment because I was not present in the chamber when the report was debated and voted on. I was, of course, part of the Agriculture Committee that developed the report. I voted in favour of the amendment to remove barns from the Bill C-234 exemptions at committee.

I was disappointed to not have had the opportunity to speak to that amendment before the chamber as a whole voted on the report, so I am taking this opportunity tonight.

To those of you who are questioning why we are revisiting an amendment that was rejected along with the committee report, I hope my intervention will offer a fresh perspective and perhaps even change a few minds.

Senator Dalphond’s amendment challenges us to reflect on the difference between barns and grain dryers in terms of their ability to respond to a price signal to reduce emissions in energy use. It is based on the supposition that there are more lower emission options for the heating of buildings than there are for grain dryers. This is a correct supposition. Senator Dalphond has already elaborated on it, and it is a powerful argument for removing barns from the Bill C-234 exemption.

The heating and cooling of buildings, including barns, can be improved with lower emissions through better insulation, construction and ventilation technologies, all of which are readily available today.

Emissions can also be reduced by switching, in whole or part, to renewable energy sources where available and by installing heat pumps — yes, heat pumps. I am aware that this humble and rather unattractive appliance, based on a technology that is many decades old, has recently become an icon of culture wars, propagated by those who are skeptical about the science of climate change, hooked on the daily use of fossil fuel or just resistant to change. They have vilified heat pumps as a kind of status imposition that violates their freedom to pollute and/or does not even address their heating and cooling needs.

It reminds me a bit of when hybrid vehicles first appeared 20 years ago. There was a feeling that if you drove a hybrid vehicle, you were trying to make a statement or be cool and maybe were not really sincere. That has, of course, changed since then; however, heat pumps seem to have that kind of image now.

In fact, there are similar culture wars going on in Europe over heat pumps. In Germany, for example, where the government tried to insist on heat pumps as the preferred source of energy for new construction, there was an uproar led by the Alternative für Deutschland, or AfD, the far-right — I won’t use the other term, but the far-right party that portrayed this support for heat pumps as a kind of socialist intervention.

Similar debates are taking place in the United States, the U.K. and Poland, typically led, again, by right-wing parties in those countries.

Let me quote from MIT Technology Review on the efficacy of heat pumps in cold climates:

The claim that heat pumps don’t work well in really cold weather is often repeated by fossil-fuel companies, which have a competing product to sell.

There’s a kernel of truth here. Heat pumps can be less efficient in extreme cold. As the temperature difference between inside and outside increases, a heat pump has to work harder to gather heat from that outside air. But there are heat pumps operating everywhere, from Alaska to Maine in the United States. In Norway — a cold country, by the way — 60% of buildings are heated with heat pumps.

Colleagues, even if heat pumps are not as efficient in extremely cold temperatures, the economic and the climate-friendly solution is to have a secondary energy source to supplement the heat source.

Let me now quote from a 2022 study by Ferguson and Sager, which has found that cold climate air-source heat pumps generate less greenhouse gas, or GHG, emissions than oil furnaces in all parts of Canada — not just in my corner of the country. These same heat pumps generate less GHG emissions than gas furnaces in B.C., Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick. The operating costs of cold climate air-source heat pumps are less than electric resistance or oil furnaces for space heating in all parts of Canada.

In regions where natural gas prices are low, the operating costs of cold climate air-source heat pumps are more comparable to the operating cost of a conventional gas furnace. In other words, the case for heat pumps, even in extremely cold temperatures, is very strong.

Senator Dalphond is correct to remind us that barns are different from grain dryers insofar as there are alternative technologies for the heating and cooling of the structures which produce lower emissions.

If we believe in the importance of the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act regime and the vital role that carbon pricing plays in incentivizing change, that should be a sufficient reason for us to support this amendment. But, colleagues, it would not be correct to extrapolate from this argument that grain dryers are off the hook. The important point here, in terms of the broader policy logic of GHG pollution pricing, is not that barns have an energy alternative and grain dryers don’t and therefore grain dryers should be spared. That fallacy is based on the idea that a carbon price only works when there are technology alternatives available.

Indeed, this is a core argument among advocates of Bill C-234 who say that the lack of alternatives to the use of natural gas for grain drying renders a fuel charge useless on that energy source.

Indeed, much of the debate on Bill C-234 has focused on when we can expect a brand new technology that will allow farmers to stop using natural gas altogether. The lack of a clear answer has been used as an argument to exempt grain drying for at least the next eight years. But this point of view represents a flawed understanding of how carbon pricing works, and we see it repeated over and over again, most recently in the letters from Pulse Canada and from one of our colleagues — who sent an email to all of us this morning.

The effect of a price signal is to incentivize farmers to reduce their use of carbon-intensive fuels using all means possible, including investments in energy efficiency based on the current technologies. The point of the carbon price is to incentivize farmers to move closer to what’s called the technology frontier — whatever the prevailing commercial technology or technologies might entail. The price mechanism — the carbon price — does not rely solely on breakthrough technologies that are totally novel, even though price signals will encourage innovation that could bring about such breakthroughs.

Some of you will argue that all grain farmers are already at the technology frontier — but that is not a credible argument. Senator Dalphond has already given some reasons why it’s not credible, but let me point to one of the bill’s star witnesses at the Agriculture and Forestry Committee, who admitted that he had only recently traded in his 50-year-old grain dryer for a new one, resulting in substantial energy and cost savings. As well, Senator Plett has just told us that the NECO grain dryer will produce large cost and energy savings. This is exactly the point of the price incentive. It is reasonable to expect that other grain drying farmers will factor in a carbon price when they are thinking about replacing their 50-year-old, 40-year-old or 30-year-old grain dryer, and perhaps switching to the NECO model.

If you are still in doubt that there are other energy efficiency measures that farmers can avail themselves of — short of a totally new energy source — consider that the federal government’s Agricultural Clean Technology Program is massively oversubscribed by farmers. Most advocates of the bill are also calling for an increase in funding for this program; we heard it at Question Period with Minister Guilbeault last week. To me, that is as clear an admission as one can have about the existence of energy efficiency measures for farmers that are available today.

Some of you will be thinking that farmers already act in their self-interest when it comes to energy efficiency, so a price signal is not necessary. I’m an economist; my own sense is that farmers are not much different from other folks, and that price incentives matter. But let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that every barn-owning, grain drying farmer is already maximizing his or her energy savings based on natural gas and propane. Let’s also assume that a brand new technology using an alternative energy source appears in eight years, which is what most advocates say will happen. At that time, farmers using natural gas will have the choice of switching to a new technology at considerable cost or paying $170 per tonne of emissions — up from $65 per tonne this year. My prediction is that they will choose neither because the adjustment cost will be too sudden and too large, and we will have made that happen. We will have allowed that to happen. Instead, what they will do is lobby Parliament to extend the exemption, which will be easy to do under the current version of this bill since we defeated the amendment proposed by Senator Moncion. What could have been a gradual adjustment to new technology based on $15 per tonne yearly increments to the price of emissions has become a massive burden that kicks in on January 1, 2031. You can see how Bill C-234 undermines the logic of pollution pricing, and intensifies political pressure to abandon the regime.

Colleagues, I will return to this idea in my third-reading speech on the main motion. I wanted to speak narrowly on the amendment. Suffice it to say for now that this amendment has great merit. In his closing remarks, Senator Dalphond asked that we draw a line against further erosion of carbon pricing in Canada. I don’t want to overdramatize, but that is what we’re doing here today. If we vote for the amendment, we will draw a line against further erosion of carbon pricing. I support the amendment, and I hope you will too.

Thank you.

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Senator Dalphond’s amendment, which was proposed at third reading of Bill C-234, An Act to amend the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act. Through this speech, I want to express my support for this amendment and outline the reasons why I am in favour of limiting the scope of the bill.

The purpose of Senator Dalphond’s amendment is to maintain the exemptions for grain drying equipment, but to remove the exemptions for heating and cooling livestock buildings. I would like to thank Senator Dalphond for this amendment, which responds to a problematic situation identified during the study of the bill by the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry.

Keeping an open mind is important at this stage of the debate so that Senator Dalphond’s amendment is reviewed objectively. From the outset, I must say that I’m disappointed in how our work has been conducted with respect to Bill C-234. The disinformation and the dissemination of anti-tax rhetoric have polluted public debate on carbon pricing and have inevitably influenced our deliberations. This has made it difficult for parliamentarians to have an objective view of the issues that the creation of new exemptions for farmers present. We have also been under intense pressure to rush through this work, preventing us from doing a thorough and complete review of the bill.

The pricing system is part of the Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change, a plan developed by the provinces and territories following consultations with Indigenous peoples. The complexity and completeness of this framework are such that it should not be dismantled bit by bit through private members’ bills.

The current government is committed to a strategy designed to combat greenhouse gases and climate change. It has introduced programs and financial incentives to support these efforts. Carbon pricing is one measure among many. It is not our role to change the priorities of the elected government, whether Liberal or Conservative.

Keep in mind that Canada’s agriculture industry is of crucial importance to our country’s economy and to the employability of Canadians. This is one of the reasons why the Canadian government invests billions of dollars in this sector, thereby ensuring that it is sustainable and competitive.

Last week, during his speech on my amendment, Senator Deacon gave an excellent speech and presented his reasons for not voting in favour of the amendment and his reasons for voting in favour of the bill. I understand his frustrations and those of other senators, as well as the feeling of powerlessness that often results from making appeals to ministers and officials. It often seems as though there is a failure to listen, and change is slow and difficult in Canada.

Despite this observation, Canada is not strong when it comes to climate change. The Canadian strategy from 2023-28 for the agriculture sector, which comes with a $3.5-billion envelope over five years, includes five priorities: the first is to strengthen the capacity, growth and competition of the sector; the second is to fight climate change and protect the environment; the third is to advance science, research and innovation; the fourth is to develop markets and competition; the fifth is to improve public trust and resilience.

The Canadian government is investing heavily in research projects to improve crops in Canada and improve the energy efficiency of the tools and equipment used in farm operation, as well as in the technologies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The agriculture industry enjoys significant and ongoing support from the Canadian government, making it a highly supported and subsidized sector.

The modernization of farm operations has evolved significantly over the past 30 years. Take, for example, the dairy industry, which has made unprecedented advances in automation, from feeding the animals to digitizing operations. This transformation brought about increased efficiency for our dairy farmers and a consolidation of operations in a highly competitive market. If you have never visited a dairy farm, I would invite you to do so. It is incredible to see the automation of operations and the digitization of practices in this area.

Let’s look at the large acreage agricultural market, which has improved over the years. The rate of return on agricultural land is more than double what it used to be. And what can we say about the technological advances in other sectors, such as animal husbandry, poultry production and egg production?

I will not revisit the carbon tax. Earlier, the senator talked about the arguments and information that were presented here in this chamber and in committee that were not exactly accurate. He did an excellent job of that, and I don’t need to go over the various points he raised in his speech. As you can see, I am moving quickly through the pages of my speech, because I don’t want to repeat the same things.

So far, climate change has received little attention in our debates. I would like to thank Senator Ringuette for her speech on my amendment, which highlighted alarming data on the human and financial costs of climate change.

These costs have a significant impact on our farmers. You may recall that, in 2021, crops were hit by a “heat dome” and 40% of Western Canada’s grain production was wiped out. The Canadian government stepped in to support the sector with a $1.1-billion contribution.

In 2022, more than $3.1 billion worth of damage was caused by extreme weather, including the derecho in Ontario and Quebec in May, Hurricane Fiona in the Maritimes in the fall, and the many summer storms, floods and forest fires in Western Canada. It’s important to remember that these costs are borne by Canadians, either through ever-increasing insurance premiums or through the taxes we pay.

In my speech, I presented several reasons that reinforce how important it is to narrow the scope of the bill. The Senate’s version of the bill must reflect the work done in committee; otherwise, we will be accused of agnotology. Agnotology is the deliberate failure to consider information that would enable us to make a sound and informed decision on the issues presented here.

Meanwhile, there are some people we have not heard from in this chamber, namely, farmers. We talked about costs. I read in a newspaper that I am an “urban senator.” Well, this urban senator has walked around barns in rubber boots. I have visited farms and walked through hayfields. I was a lender for 38 years, and some of the balance sheets I had to review during that time were from the agricultural sector.

Farmers are extremely smart business people. They are very knowledgeable. They are business people looking for ways to improve their yields, looking to earn more. Farmers are often rich in assets: land, animals, milk quotas, grain tonnage.

To come back to what Senator Plett said about grain drying, I went up north this weekend. I went home, but I also went up north. What we are seeing in the north is that the snow has arrived and farmers there are finished harvesting and drying grain. However, farmers in other areas are still drying grain. If you take Highway 17 toward Cobden, you will see the grain dryers running at full tilt these days. Farmers are not finished drying their grain yet, but they are almost done, depending on where they are in Canada.

In summary, the Canadian government is working closely with the country’s agricultural industry. What really disappoints me about Bill C-234 is the amount of disinformation that we were given. I don’t often rise to speak to bills because I don’t always have the expertise required. I am not claiming to be an expert in the agricultural field, but although we may have had turkey for Thanksgiving, we have been fed a lot of bologna here over the past few weeks. I don’t like when that’s done to Canadian senators or parliamentarians.

To conclude my speech, all I can say is that we are very smart people. We were appointed to the Senate for a reason. We have to work diligently when making decisions as important as these.

I really liked Senator Boisvenu’s comment this afternoon when he said that we are proposing simple solutions to complex problems. That is what we have here: extremely simple solutions to extremely complex situations. I urge all senators to be cautious in the decisions they make. Whatever choices we make, we will have to live with them, and they should be environmentally sound in our minds. In my case, I am not comfortable with Bill C-234, and it is out of step with my views on ecology. I will vote in favour of Senator Dalphond’s amendment, but I will be voting against this bill. It goes against my principles and values. Thank you.

Yes, I will.

What I will say is that, depending on what is being harvested — because I have the numbers — some will dry for 21 days and the amount of humidity and all that, I have that information. But no, senator. It’s a seasonal activity, and depending on where you are in Canada, once your grain has been dried, according to my knowledge — and I can be corrected — they are put in containers and they wait to be shipped if they are going to market. That drying needs to be done quickly because they don’t want the grains or whatever is being dried — and there are four categories — to rot. So it is done, and I understand it’s done over a longer period of time. It is seasonal because of the way we harvest here in Canada.

The other thing that I know is that when farmers have their fields, they don’t plant the same thing everywhere, so they will start harvesting some products with a longer drying time, and they will work their way through the drying season. It’s the same when they put the seed in the ground in the spring. They also slate so that they don’t harvest everything at the same time. As I said, they are very smart, and they have the technology that is helping them.

I agree with you. But the drying season is not the whole year, and it’s not every grain farmer.

If I look at the North, for example, I know that their drying season is done because what they harvest is done.

In the North, where I live on the weekend, it is finished for the season.

Thank you, Your Honour. I had not intended to speak at this point in the debate, and I only intend to speak once unless I run out of time.

To make my views clear on this, as I think many of you know, I will not support this amendment, and I will support the bill in its unamended form.

I don’t intend to respond to the observations that have been made earlier, except to offer that, myself — having a little bit of pedigree with respect to this issue — I support Canada’s climate change agenda implemented equitably and fully support carbon pricing as an essential tool in achieving climate goals.

I heat my house entirely with heat pumps. I drive an electric car, and all over the top of the roof of my house are solar panels, at some cost. Despite the arguments that Senator Woo might have made, it’s not a break-even proposition.

I want to talk a little bit about agriculture and Prairie farmers, what this bill is about, what it isn’t about and a few points that lean towards support for the bill.

I know a bit about agriculture — though not a lot — and I have learned a good deal more serving as a permanent member of the Agriculture and Forestry Committee for a few years, not just during the hearings on the bill and not just during clause by clause. This portion of my remarks is drawn from some personal experience, from some evidence we have heard and from government documents.

Prairie farmers — particularly Saskatchewan farmers — are committed to the environment. I will mention three points on this: commitment, innovation and achievements.

First, I will speak about commitment and a personal story. My father-in-law — now deceased — was a farmer. Every fall in western Saskatchewan, hunters descend on the area enthusiastically to shoot wildlife, in particular, ducks and geese. It’s a major flyway. At the end of the hunting season, perhaps around mid-November when the weather was turning cold, my father-in-law would go out, not to hunt geese, but to rescue them.

During hunting season, hunters wound geese. The geese wouldn’t be able to fly, and they would be left in small lakes, ponds and dugouts, and as winter approached and ice settled on these lakes and ponds, these geese caught in the ice would freeze to death — a terrible death.

My father-in-law would go out in a small boat with burlap sacks and rescue these not very cooperative geese. He even built a compound where they could be housed and nursed back to health and set free, if possible. At one point, he had two dozen Canada geese in this compound. They weren’t particularly friendly, but they were alive and well. This is a commitment to the environment that he did not have to make, and thousands of farmers in the West do this — and probably all over the country.

Innovation. In my province there is a remarkable partnership between the federal and provincial governments, farmers, agriculture producers, innovators, business leaders and universities to advance agriculture in sustainable ways. Senator Klyne talked about one, and I will skip over that example of a magical combination of partners to produce better results for farmers, less burdensome treatments of the soil and returning carbon to the soil.

We have heard dozens of stories at the Agriculture Committee about these practices, which are good practices and benefiting the environment at the same time. They are inspiring. As I say to the Agriculture Committee from time to time about my service on the committee — and they are sick of hearing it — I came to doubt, and stayed to pray.

Here are two pieces of information. First, in the last 30 years or so, there has been a 33% increase in agriculture productivity on the Prairies. That is 33% with no — I repeat, no — increase in greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture. This is the Government of Canada’s information, and no other part of the country has produced that kind of achievement or close to it.

Second, carbon dioxide emissions from agriculture production, specifically relevant to Saskatchewan, these numbers are so spectacular that I had to check to make sure I was not making them up or that Premier Scott Moe was not making them up. The source is Dr. Raymond Desjardins, probably the most outstanding agri-scientist in Canada and a lifelong employee of the Government of Canada. Now retired, he is a Member of the Order of Canada and co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate for his work on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Good enough for me; I hope, good enough for you.

In speaking about the achievement in Saskatchewan, this is information the Government of Canada gathered to determine greenhouse gas emissions resulting from the production of various feed crops grown across the country. The measure is the amount of greenhouse gas emissions per hectare of land for each type of crop grown, province by province.

Saskatchewan has 47% to 49% of Canada’s arable land, so this is pretty darn significant nationally. For every crop grown in Saskatchewan — and most crops are grown in Saskatchewan to some degree and, in some cases, to a large degree — emissions per hectare are dramatically lower than for any other province, so dramatic it’s unbelievable.

For oilseeds, for example, only half the emissions per hectare of the next best province and five times better than the national average. For pulse crops, five times better than the next province. For cereal crops, five times better than the next province and ten times better than the national average. For spring wheat — there is a lot of spring wheat — four times lower than the next best and ten times better than the national average. Even potatoes, for God’s sake. These are greenhouse gas miracles probably not replicated anywhere in the world.

These results suggest to me, more importantly, that the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and, quite frankly, Mr. Poilievre, who desperately needs a climate strategy — sorry, Your Honour — should be getting themselves out to Saskatchewan to find out how this miracle is being achieved.

Let’s come to the bill, and what the bill is about and what it’s not about. The political and procedural maneuvering and, sometimes, posturing at the Agriculture Committee and here in our chamber have been a distraction for what this bill is all about and what we should be doing. I urge you not to be distracted by them as we examine the wisdom of this bill. It is not a litmus test for the carbon tax, writ large. Nor is it the thin edge of the wedge or — as lawyers and judges often say — the opening of the flood gates.

We have learned this, quite frankly, recently from recent developments that Senator Dalphond was honourable enough at least to mention.

If we take that view that we should be captured by these large political and controversial approaches, we deny ourselves the opportunity to take our responsibilities seriously when it comes to the public policy analysis of this bill. Setting these distractions aside makes it possible for us to consider the bill on its merits, what it will achieve and what it will cost.

What about the financial implications? Grain drying and farm building heating is a small, though not insignificant, expense to farmers. We have heard that we’re talking here about a billion dollars collected over eight years, but as senators pointed out, most of this money is returned in rebates. I think Senator Ringuette’s number was 90%.

The issue, though difficult to isolate, is that the return is not delivered consistently to producers, meaning that some farmers get less than they pay — and in some cases quite a bit less — and for these farmers, it’s a meaningful cost. According to what we heard at committee, it tends to be the smaller farmers who fall into this category, so it is somewhat tougher for them.

Another important distraction is that the carbon tax on these fuels will drive up grocery costs. This is largely a fallacy. Regardless of what you hear, the cost has to be absorbed by farmers, who with some exceptions, are price takers in the market. They are not able to pass the costs along by charging higher prices for their products.

Try to sell your wheat to Cargill and ask a little bit more for a bushel of wheat because you had to spend a bit more drying it. So for a number of farmers, the cost comes right off the bottom line.

What about the cost to the environment? Agriculture accounts for 73 megatonnes of greenhouse gas emissions nationally. Heating fuel, according to Government of Canada statistics, represents 1.7% of that or 1.2 megatonnes of greenhouse gas.

Now, some of this heating fuel stuff occurs in backstop provinces, and some is probably heating fuel that is not part of the grain dryer or farm building issue, but let’s say it’s a megatonne of emissions per year. Now, as senators have said, the carbon tax doesn’t eliminate these emissions; it incentivizes changes in behaviour to reduce emissions. How much will that incentive be? It’s hard to tell.

The only empirical example I could find is from Canada’s Ecofiscal Commission, an organization advocating for carbon pricing. They estimate that after 10 years of a carbon tax on gasoline in British Columbia, gas consumption declined by 7%.

Incentivizing a carbon-based energy reduction in grain drying is a bit trickier, and in farm buildings as well, but let’s say that it would happen at that rate or even double. Optimistically, after 10 years of a carbon price incentive, we could expect a 10% or maybe a 20% drop in CO2 emissions — maybe 0.2 megatonnes.

Let’s put this into perspective. Canada’s overall goal is to drop GHG emissions by 250 megatonnes by 2050. So this issue is, at most, one thousandth of the issue. We should put it into perspective.

Here is another way of looking at it: The Government of Canada, my government, is planting 2 billion trees this decade — a great incentive, I think. It was to contribute 11 to 12 megatonnes of CO2 savings towards our target.

How are we doing? So poorly that the Commissioner of the Environment reported late last spring and testified before our committee that we will fall short 7 to 8 megatonnes. That shortfall represents fully 3% or more of our total goal nationally, in every respect, for 2050 — somewhere between 30 and 50 times the issue we’re talking about today. I think that if we were really serious about this, we would be talking about the bigger issues in our own backyard. This bill produces a very modest setback to the climate change goal, I would acknowledge, and a modest benefit for farmers.

However, in the context of Canada and agriculture, certain industries — and I think this is one — face greater vulnerabilities than others. Indeed, the exemption provided for farm fuel is a perfect example of that. Since the objective of exempting farm fuel is to enable agriculture production to occur without excessive burdens, this is a minor additional contribution to that.

The government itself has recognized that, going forward, agriculture and agri-food will be one of a small number of pillars of the Canadian economy. A report led by Senator Harder made the same point. Whether we think of agriculture as a line of work for Canadians, as a way of feeding Canadians, as a way of feeding the world or as a way of selling product into the world to generate foreign exchange, the importance of agriculture to the country’s future cannot be underestimated. It levels the playing field in relation to our agriculture competitors — in a minor way, I admit — including the United States.

Finally, let me come to what I will call a nation-building perspective. I fear that, in some respects, Bill C-234 has taken on a symbolic meaning well beyond its actual practical effects. I hope I have made that point.

Part of this line of argument seems to engage the urban-rural divide in this country, and to some extent this debate hasn’t helped. Part of it is interpreted as political tension regarding the degree to which the Government of Canada respects the interests of the West, and particularly the Prairies — a little ironic, since nearly two thirds of the benefit will go to Ontario. Admittedly, there are tension points in the country, and we should be attentive to trying to address them constructively. It is not a sole compelling reason for supporting Bill C-234 in its original form, but it is a factor.

A year or two ago, I quoted a decision in an important case of the Supreme Court of Canada — probably the most important case the court ever decided. In speaking about the very nature of Canada, a unanimous court quoted the following:

A nation is built when the communities that comprise it make commitments to it, when they forego choices and opportunities on behalf of a nation . . . when the communities that comprise it make compromises, when they offer each other guarantees, when they make transfers and perhaps most pointedly, when they receive from others the benefits of national solidarity. The threads of a thousand acts of accommodation are the fabric of a nation. . . .

The accommodation in Bill C-234 is one such thread. Thank you.

This is the sort of thing where I should lean over to my colleague and ask the question privately, but it’s rude to be whispering in class. I would like to ask a question.

Certainly.

Thank you. We can perhaps disagree on the empirics of Bill C-234, but on the question of the thin end of the wedge or the slippery slope argument, I received a letter from your premier not long ago — and perhaps all of you did as well — in which he said, more or less, “You’d better pass this bill.” But he said, “Once this is done, I want to eliminate the tax on everything for everyone.”

How should we think about that kind of political statement and pressure on this chamber?

May I have a moment to respond to that?

Is leave granted?

I’m a bit surprised that Senator Plett agreed because one of the points I want to make is that my premier is not the only one who is not very happy with the carbon tax. You hear that he and others have a campaign to axe the tax.

I received the same letter. I wrote back to Premier Moe. I didn’t put it out in public, but I did explain my position on this question, which is that each of these questions should be decided more or less on their own merits. Quite frankly, I don’t buy the idea that the Government of Canada got it right 100%, as if it came fully built out of the head of Zeus. There are adjustments to be made, and one of them was made two weeks ago. Each of these questions is entitled to be considered on its own merits.

We will probably disagree in this chamber about what those merits are. However, that doesn’t mean that this, therefore, overwhelmingly endorses the position that my premier or some leaders in the national government make, namely, that this achieves a victory in its opposition to the carbon tax. I don’t buy that myself, and I don’t agree with it.

Honourable senators, I want to thank my colleagues Senators Dalphond, Plett, Ringuette, Woo, Moncion and Cotter. You have heard me speak in the past about the value of debate. In my short experience in the Senate, those debates have certainly changed my opinion going into a vote.

Tonight and earlier today and this week, we have heard different “facts.” I put that in quotes because some argue that they are facts, and some argue that they are not facts. We have heard about grain drying being done, or maybe it’s not done. We have heard about some of the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s statistics. We have heard references to P.E.I. being a municipality. Grain farmers have access to technologies, but we have also heard that those technologies aren’t yet available in an economical way.

We also heard in the past — and I have added my voice — about the issue of food security and about the cost of consumable goods for consumers. Tonight an amendment was placed before us. I have read the amendment during the debate to try to find the relationship of the debate with respect to this specific amendment.

I think there needs to be time for reflection. I therefore move the adjournment of the debate.