Wake up on climate change, Greenpeace tells Canada

Last week’s announcement that former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had won the Nobel Peace Prize was applauded by Greenpeace Canada, but the environmental activist group had a warning: wake up Canada.
“This is excellent news,” said Greenpeace Canada spokesperson Joslyn Higginson. “This prize, and the incredible attention it adds to this issue, will only bring greater pressure to bear on nations like Canada and the United States, who are delinquent in the global fight against climate change.”
According to Greenpeace, the announcement also rings alarm bells for Canadians.
“While the entire world is applauding the efforts and accomplishments of Al Gore and the IPCC in combating climate change, the Harper government is playing petty politics with the biggest threat of our time,” said Higginson.
The announcement comes at a critical time. Reports from the opposition suggest that in its upcoming Throne Speech the Harper government is preparing, once again, to claim that Canada’s Kyoto commitments cannot be met. Kyoto countries are also expected to meet in Bali this December to discuss these commitments.
“This is all the more disturbing in the context of Mr. Gore’s characterization of the fight against climate change as a moral and ethical challenge, not a political one,” said Higginson.
“Here, as everywhere, climate change is a moral and ethical question that can only be met with leadership and resolve. That is exactly where Canada is falling short.”
Last April, Gore, author of the award-winning book and documentary An Inconvenient Truth, criticized the Harper-Baird climate change plan. Gore blasted the Conservatives’ new policy as a “complete and total fraud … designed to mislead the Canadian people” and urged Canadians to increase pressure on their government.
“International recognition for Mr. Gore and the IPCC only brings the inadequacies of the Harper-Baird plan into starker relief,” Higginson said.