NDP proposes new climate plan

author: taylor balfour | news writer

rage for the 15/ jeremy davis

New climate plan amidst carbon pricing controversy

The NDP recently took a stand against climate change with the recent announcement of their new climate plan.

“Tackling climate change is one of the great moral issues of our time and it is our responsibility to act now,” the NDP claim on their website. “In Saskatchewan alone, we produce the highest greenhouse gas emissions per capita in all of Canada.”

The NDP’s plan, which they have titled “Renew Saskatchewan,” focuses on providing “assessments and financing for clean energy installations or retrofits for homes, farms, businesses, industry, municipalities and reserves,” according to the statement on their website.

A fund is to be established that will help offset the upfront cost of retrofitting or installing clean energy solutions such as solar.

The goal is that the installation costs of clean energy installations will be handled by the fund as Ryan Meili, the leader of the Saskatchewan NDPs, says, “People want to make the shift to clean energy, but the up-front cost stops them, even though it would save a lot of money over the long term,” and hopes that this plan eliminates that barrier.

In comparison, the Sask Party’s plan is entitled “Prairie Resilience,” and describes the plan as one that focuses on “principles of readiness and resilience to support the province and its people, curb greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and prepare for changing conditions – such as extreme weather, drought or wildfire – without a tax.”

The program, according to the Sask Party’s website, was released in December 2017, and that they currently have steps in place to “work towards implementation of the provincial climate change strategy on January 1, 2019.”

Some of the coming steps include “development of resilience measures and targets, further legislative amendments and compliance options.”

While the NDP in their statements have discussed their plans for handling climate change, they also don’t shy away from discussing what they believe to be the Sask Party’s lack of focus on the issue.

“Scott Moe has once again come up empty in providing Saskatchewan with sound economic and environmental leadership,” Meili said in a statement on their website.

“He’s spent the last year pointing fingers and railing against a flawed federal approach, but he’s shown no initiative and no leadership in putting forward a plan that works for Saskatchewan people.”

Young people, specifically, have been reported in recent years to be more focused on the environment than Baby Boomers and Generation X, with a Nielsen study reporting that in young people surveyed between the ages of 15 – 20, the number of those who are “committed to positive social and environmental impact” grew from “55 per cent in 2014 to 72 per cent in 2015.”

“Moe’s failure to be proactive on this hurts us economically today and leaves us more vulnerable to changes tomorrow,” Meili says.

“The climate crisis is real and government should be taking bold action to remove the barriers that keep people from acting on it.”