Welcome to Kyoto, Canada

This week the federal government voted in the House of Commons to ratify the Kyoto Protocol by a vote of 195-77. Three of the House's main political parties - Liberals, Bloc Quebecois and New Democrats - joined forces (an unusual event in itself) in support of this international climate change accord. The Progressive Conservatives and Canadian Alliance provided the opposing votes to the overwhelming majority. By Thursday, the ratification vote had passed through the senate. All that remains is to deliver the signed accord to the United Nations.

The controversial accord signed by dozens of countries around the world is only part of the story, particularly in this country. What the Kyoto accord provided is another example of the current bump ridden ride the federal Liberal government finds itself on under Mr. Chretien's prolonged retirement.

The good news is that at least this time, the federal Liberals have stumbled their way to the right decision.

The Kyoto protocol was signed way back in 1997 in Kyoto Japan, which committed signatories to fairly drastic reductions in the amount of their greenhouse gas emissions (http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/convkp/k... Specifically, Canada is committed to cutting its greenhouse gas emissions to six per cent below the levels we produced in 1990. Given that throughout the 1980's and even into the 1990's the level of carbon dioxide output - a major contributor to green gas increases - continued to increase significantly, an argument could be made that dropping to anywhere near 1990 levels hardly goes far enough to reducing the amount of greenhouse output we contribute to the earth's environment each year.

Largely, Canadians seem to support the idea of Kyoto Protocol, or at least the idea of it given the enormous amount of information out there from both sides of the debate. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change tries to simplify its climate change report by simply defining the need for climate change as a problem that "involves complex interactions between climatic, environmental, economic, political, institutional, social and technological processes," which is the kind of description that makes most Canadians say "huh?"

Accord opponents - those who wish us to turn down the accord - have failed to adequately explain their position. Indeed, the principal dissenting argument centers on the notion that ratification of the accord will cost jobs and money. Even if that is the case - and many such as the Suzuki Foundation dispute those claims - there does come a point when responsible global citizens have to declare 'so what?' Surely there are concerns - in Canada and abroad - that are larger than economic impact.

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