Climate wasn’t on Harper’s agenda

Issue ignored in Yukon visit

The U.S. secretary of state this week urged anyone running for high office to come to the North to talk climate change, but as Stephen Harper campaigned there Friday, it wasn’t on his agenda.

While the North feels the impact of global warming likely more keenly than any other region of Canada, Harper didn’t mention the issue in his remarks, nor has he referenced it yet on this campaign.

When asked why, Harper was succinct.

“I believe the two major issues in this campaign are economy and security,” he said.

Harper was in Whitehorse for the final day of his campaign week to make announcements on both those fronts aimed at ensuring his party keeps its hold on the lone riding in the territory.

He pledged that Yukon will receive a new military reserve unit as part of a previous campaign pledge to increase the size of the Forces reserves to 30,000 from 24,000. The territory last had its own reserve regiment in 1968.

He also pledged $9 million over three years starting in 2016 for a tourism program to attract recreational anglers, hunters and snowmobiles from the U.S.

There were also a series of new measures aimed at hunters — an annual program beginning in 2017 to sustain habitats that support bird, moose and turkey populations at a cost of $5 million a year and new rules around the hunting of migratory birds, which would, among other things, allow a family to hunt them on a single permit.

But on climate change, there was nothing new. He reiterated the government’s target of a 30 per cent reduction in emissions over 2005 levels by 2030, which will be presented at UN climate conference in Paris in December.

There has yet been no plan released on how Canada will achieve that target.

“This is going to be the subject, ultimately, not of a decision by the government of Canada. but by a decision of the international community in December and I’m optimistic that’s headed in the right direction,” he said.

Harper’s flight to Yukon likely crossed paths with the departing flights of world leaders who had been in Alaska this week for an international summit on Arctic issues.

Canada’s delegation was led by a senior civil servant, rather than Foreign Affairs Minister Rob Nicholson, whose absence was pegged to the federal election.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry made reference to Nicholson’s absence:

“I think anybody running for any high office in any nation in the world should come to Alaska ... and inform themselves about this. It’s a seismic challenge that is affecting millions of people today.