Oral Questions (The Environment)

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, on Monday, the IPCC released its first update in six years on impacts, vulnerability, and adaptation, demonstrating that even low degrees of warming globally can lead to abrupt and irreversible changes, threatening global security and even human civilization itself.

In 2009, the Prime Minister committed this country to joining the world to avoid those small changes in temperature. My question for the Prime Minister is that given that Environment Canada now projects a 100% failure rate in meeting our 2020 target, is the government and this country still committed to the Copenhagen target? If so, when will he publish a credible plan—?

Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, as you know, the government remains committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, while doing so in a way that obviously respects Canadians’ jobs and protects our economy. I am happy to note that under this government, for the first time in history we have both growth and jobs and we actually are seeing emissions reductions. The government will continue to work on getting our emissions down.