New Brunswick’s opposition parties say a lack of answers from the province’s environment minister during a meeting of the legislature’s estimates committee shows that addressing climate change is not a priority for the government.
Minister of environment and climate change Gary Crossman spent the morning answering questions from opposition critics, sticking mostly to outlining the broad strokes of the department’s program from a piece of paper rather than engage with questions about policy decisions.
That left Liberal environment critic Gilles Lepage frustrated after the meeting.
“I don’t think this government takes climate change issues as important as it should be. I don’t think that they know what’s going on in the ground in our regions, on our coastlines, shores, with our air quality, with our water issues, with our erosion,” he said.
Lepage spent much of his time asking about the province’s Climate Change Fund and Environmental Trust Fund, which are the main avenues through which climate-related projects are funded in the province. This year the two funds are receiving $47 million and $9 million respectively. That’s the same figure as last year, even as requests for funding from the two programs totalled $88 million and $23.5 million last year.
Lepage asked why the funding wasn’t increased to meet the demand, pointing to a recent auditor general’s report that said the ETF has an unused $41 million surplus and routinely rejects worthy projects without explanation.
Crossman replied, rightly, that the $56 million in dedicated climate funding is the largest amount ever budgeted by the provincial government, before reading off the purpose of the funds.
“We recognize the impact that climate change is having and government will continue to explore programs. We are confident that the 2023-24 budget of $47 million to the climate change fund will meet our priorities and meet the activities laid out in our climate change action plan,” he said.
“The fund will be used to support the implementation of the climate change action plan and continue to ensure that we are supporting the necessary actions to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate change.”
Leblanc said he feels the province isn’t doing enough through the two funding streams to address the impact of climate change and prepare for the future.
“There’s double the amount of ask in projects, in community based projects that could help this province with environmental issues and they’re not acting on it,” he said.
Green MLA Megan Mitton also expressed frustration over how her questions were answered.
“I would say that my questions were not always being answered today and it’s pretty frustrating,” she said.
Mitton asked several times how premier Blaine Higgs’ desire to see increased shale gas development in the province fits in with climate goals.
Crossman wouldn’t say if he felt the two were compatible or how shale gas would fit into the Climate Change Action Plan.
“A commitment to net-zero does not mean there would be no carbon emitting activity in the province, it simply means that any natural gas emissions generated by natural gas development would need to offset the carbon removal. We do need a strong plan and continue to meet our targets,” he said.
Mitton said she was left feeling pessimistic about the province’s attitude towards climate action.
“There’s not true leadership on the climate,” she said.
“When you have a premier constantly saying he wants to make fracking happen in the province, it’s very hard to take it seriously that they care at all about the climate crisis.”
Crossman would not stop to answer questions from reporters on his way out of committee.
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