Telegraph Journal: MLAs to hear climate change opinions

JOHN CHILIBECK LEGISLATURE BUREAU
FREDERICTON A new legislative committee will hear from anybody in the province who wants to express their view on climate change – no matter how long it takes, says the Liberal chairman.  
Andrew Harvey, a backbench Liberal MLA and former businessman who heads the committee, said in an interview anyone who requests an appearance through the Office of the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly by July 15 will get a hearing of up to 20 minutes.  
“It’s crucial – climate change could affect the types of jobs we have in the future, the kind of lifestyles we live,” said Harvey,who used to own the Sugar Moon Cookhouse in Florenceville.
“The high heat and all the storms, the pain and suffering and disruption to people’s lives – it’s going to touch everybody.”  
The committee,struck by Brian Gallant’s Liberal government, includes MLAs from all three parties in the assembly: five Grits, two Progressive Conservatives and one Green.  
Environmentalists are hoping it produces a document that captures what they call the urgency of the problem, one that seeks bold remedies to combat rising global temperatures.  
Lois Corbett, the executive director of the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, said in a recent interview an all-party committee was a better way to consult the public than a majority government launching its own consultations.  
She pointed to the work of the select committee of wood supply, a Tory-dominated group of MLAs that began its meetings in October 2003. Its deliberations carried over eight months, including 13 public hearings in seven communities across the province.  
“The results were a surprise. Some people were cynical about what the committee would produce, but in the end they came up with an excellent report and recommendations,” Corbett said.  
The wood supply committee chaired by Tory MLA Kirk MacDonald released a report in September 2004 that said management of Crown, or public, land should be decided in close consultation with the public and that sound scientific advice on the health of the forests should guide future policy.  
“They recommended what people wanted, which was control over Crown lands,”Corbett said.  
The climate change committee wants to produce a report for the legislative assembly in advance of the next international climate change conference in Marrakesh, Morocco, from Nov. 7-18.  
At the meeting, United Nations members are supposed to build on the agreement signed in Paris last year that stated the world’s countries and regional governments should work to keep a global temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.  
Already, Ottawa and the provinces have formed three working groups to look at different angles of the same problem – what to do about greenhouse gas emissions, which the majority of scientists and world leaders now agree are raising global temperatures and causing major disruptions and hazards.  
The chief culprits are:  
burning of fossil fuels for energy, such as oil, gas and coal;  
cutting of forests whose trees naturally store carbon and release gas when they are felled;  
increase of livestock farming, as cattle and other ruminants release methane gas;  
production of fertilizers that contain nitrogen, another greenhouse gas.  
While federal and provincial civil servants in Canada work behind the scenes to come up with credible ways to reduce emissions, New Brunswick’s select committee on climate change is scheduled to travel the province to hear from experts and the public over three weeks in late August and early September.   
Times and locations will be announced once the July 15 deadline passes. Harvey said the three weeks would be extended if the response is strong enough. Ads promoting the consultations have already appeared in newspapers and online.  
“Anyone and everyone who wants to appear before our committee will have their time to appear,” Harvey pledged. “Anyone. If someone wants to come to our committee, they just have to submit a brief or executive summary of a brief, and then they have an opportunity to appear before the committee.”  
He said after the public consultations are over, the committee would spend about a month deliberating and preparing a report with recommendations, which will be delivered to the legislative assembly by mid-October. Those recommendations would then be used by government officials in the lead up to the Marrakesh conference.  
Civil servants in the Department of Environment and Local Government have already produced a discussion paper on climate change as a basis for the consultations and the committee is being briefed by Jeff Hoyt, a manager in the department.  
The committee will also accept written submissions from the public. They should be submitted to the Office of the Clerk by Aug. 19, by email at leg-consul? tations@gnb.ca? , by mail, fax or online.

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