PCs dismiss dozens of amendments to environment bill

The Houston government extended the hours for debate Wednesday to move legislation through the House faster, and used most of that time to systematically reject almost every suggestion put forward by opposition members to amend Bill 57, the Environmental Goals and Climate Change Reduction Act.

Many of those changes echoed suggestions proposed by members of the public who appeared before the legislature's law amendments committee on Monday. The PC members of that committee rejected those changes and sent the proposed law back to the House unchanged.

Wednesday was the first opportunity for members of the Nova Scotia Legislature to try to amend the bill on the floor of the chamber. Of the 32 amendments — 11 Liberal, 19 NDP and 2 Independent — only two were accepted by the party in power.

Some of the amendments turned down were:

• Increasing the percentage of electricity generated by renewable sources from 80 to 90 per cent by 2030.
• Creating an independent commissioner to monitor progress of the goals set out in the act.
• Setting a date for ending offshore oil and gas exploration.
• Measures aimed at boosting the sale of electric vehicles in Nova Scotia.
• Speeding up the implementation of the Lahey report on sustainable forestry.
• Measures aimed at better protecting the Isthmus of Chignecto.

The only two amendments accepted by the government were proposed by Black MLAs, Liberal Tony Ince and New Democrat Suzy Hansen. Ince's amendment was to add the words African Nova Scotian communities to a line in the bill, while Hansen's suggestion was to "create a panel to address environmental racism by the end of 2022 with recommendations for redress coming to the province by the end of 2023."

Hansen's amendment was adopted just seconds after she expressed disappointment at the way the votes were going for opposition members throughout the evening's debate.

"It is exhausting to stand up here and listen to the constant noes and nays when we're supposed to be building up a great bill and creating something together for our province," said Hansen.

Earlier, Liberal MLA Brendan Maguire proposed an amendment focused on energy retrofits for low income housing, then he crumpled the piece of paper with the amendment into a ball and tossed it away in a show of frustration.

"And this is what I'll do to the amendment, because we've already been told it's not happening," he told his House colleagues. The amendment was subsequently defeated.

In the end, all 49 MLAs who were present voted in favour of sending the bill to third and final reading, which could happen as early as Thursday.

In his address to the House, Environment Minister Tim Halman promised more action was coming on what is outlined in the bill.

"The details on how these goals will be attained once the bill is passed will be articulated and outlined in the climate change plan, which is going to be put out in the spring of 2022," said Halman. "And I want to let all Nova Scotians know that the feedback provided at law amendments will be taken into consideration as we develop the climate change plan."

For his part, Premier Tim Houston left the chamber buoyant that Bill 57 received all-party support, despite the fact his government only accepted two of the 32 amendments proposed.

"The number the public should focus on is 49," said Houston. "That's how many MLAs voted for that bill when it was all said and done and zero voted against it."

"It's a good piece of legislation, it's ambitious, it leads the country."

MORE TOP STORIES