QUESTION PERIOD — Ministry of Justice
Environmental Justice
October 5, 2022
Welcome, Minister Lametti. I’m sure you are aware of increasingly diversified litigation on intrinsically related environmental matters that impact our already overloaded judicial system. To name a few, environmental activists, Indigenous leaders and Black communities are being arrested for defending their land, water and air from pollution. There have been lawsuits from provinces for too much action against climate change, lawsuits from citizens for not enough action on climate change, rural communities potentially suing oil and gas companies for unpaid taxes and lawsuits against corporations for misleading and greenwashing.
My question is: How is your government comfortable with the clarity of present environmental laws, its ability to meet its climate commitments and implementing the “polluter pays” principle?
Thank you, senator. I mentioned a moment ago that every mandate letter for every minister contained a clause on reconciliation. The other mandatory clause has been climate. Everything that all of us do is filtered through the lens of fighting climate change and protecting our environment. You’ve asked a very complex question, which I can’t possibly answer in a minute and a half because of its complexity, and it touches not just what I do but what all of us do here as well.
We are trying on multiple fronts to fight climate change. We have put a price on pollution as one element of a climate change policy, but it will also involve an economic transformation. In a positive sense, there is a new green economy that Canada is uniquely positioned to lead on, and sometimes we have to go to court to defend that vision, which we have done successfully and which we will continue to do successfully. I take a strong hand as Attorney General in the way those cases devolve.
But we will continue. And it requires working with Indigenous peoples; it requires working with business; it requires working with community groups; and it requires working with municipalities, provinces and territories. It’s complex and it touches the work that all of us do, but we don’t have any options.
