Green leader adamant 'climate referendum' not lost in election results
Credit to Author: Derrick Penner| Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2019 02:02:19 +0000
VICTORIA — Just because the federal Green party won only a few seats in the general election, it doesn’t mean what Leader Elizabeth May declared “a referendum on climate change” has been lost, she said Tuesday.
May said Tuesday afternoon that she was “wasting no time” in making the point to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “that most Canadian voters voted for parties that said they were ready to step up and take climate change seriously.”
“I had a conversation with Justin Trudeau today and I started pressing him,” May said by telephone. “It’s early days, we don’t know who the environment minister is going to be or how this parliament will function.”
However, May said she won’t let the issue rest while preparations are made to open the 43rd session of parliament.
May made the statement as all party leaders parsed what Monday’s election results meant.
With 156 MPs, the Liberals won the most seats, but not enough to form a governable majority. The Conservatives topped the popular vote, capturing 35 per cent of ballots against the Liberal’s 33 per cent, but ballots were heavily concentrated in the West and suburban Ontario ridings.
Pointing to the broad Conservative blue swath across the Prairies as Liberals were swept out of Alberta and Saskatchewan, Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer said Trudeau’s government will have to act to start bridging a growing rift with those provinces.
“We will fight for you. We will do everything we can to make sure that this Liberal government understands that it has to change course,” Scheer said during a postelection media conference. “It cannot continue to attack our energy sector.”
Green Leader Elizabeth May reacts while waiting for results from the federal election in Victoria.
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe and Alberta Premier Jason Kenney added their voices with letters to Trudeau. Moe called on Trudeau to cancel the federal carbon tax and reform equalization payments.
Kenney urged Trudeau not to broker agreements with the NDP or Green parties to maintain government if it would block the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion or natural gas exports from the West.
On election night, while celebrating the Greens’ best federal election results, winning three seats and doubling its share of the popular vote to 6.5 per cent, May lamented that it hadn’t elected enough MPs to press its own case in a minority government.
“We clearly didn’t have enough people voting Green to ensure we can press forward with the only climate plan (among party platforms) rooted in science,” May said.
“But it doesn’t mean Canadians don’t care about climate,” she said, as the Liberals and NDP “greenwashed” their own platforms to appear more ambitious on climate action.
As for facing a Conservative opposition that feels alienated over energy development and support for pipelines, May will hold her position because “we are running out of time, and it’s science, it’s not a political issue.”
May said she knows MPs in Scheer’s caucus who have different views on the subject from their leader and she believes more needs to be done to make the case for climate action directly with Alberta and Albertans.
Government needs to spell out the alternatives to a fossil-fuel-based economy that could be built using the billions of dollars it would take to build the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
“If we can’t communicate that we’re in this together, we’re failures as leaders,” May said.
How the Greens might cooperate with NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh’s caucus, however, remains to be seen after their bitter exchanges in the late days of the election campaign over misleading advertising.
May said she hasn’t spoken to Singh since the election, but they will likely talk when Parliament resumes and she isn’t sure how that conversation will go.
“It depends if he’s prepared to say sorry for saying things we didn’t say,” May said. “That would be a good start.”
With files from The Canadian Press