Majority Vote in Parliament: “the position of Canada’s environment minister does not represent that of most Canadians and the international community will know it now”

Parliament voted 137-124 on a motion to urge the minority Conservative government to cut global warming pollution 25% below 1990 levels on Tuesday.

That’s the lower edge of what’s scientifically recommended and in line with the European Union (and now Quebec!).

All three opposition parties supported the motion. It was a Bloc Quebecois opposition day motion. So no real legal weight.

“However it demonstrates that the position of Canada’s environment minister does not represent that of most Canadians when he goes to Copenhagen and the international community will know it now,”  Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe told AFP.

The motion stated:

That, in the opinion of the House, Canada should commit to propose at the Copenhagen conference on climate change:

1. reducing, through absolute reduction targets, greenhouse gas emissions in industrialized countries to 25% lower than 1990 levels, by 2020;

2. the necessity of limiting the rise in global temperatures to less than 2oC higher than in the preindustrial era; and

3. supporting the developing countries in their efforts to reduce greenhouse gases and adapt to climate change