Labour, NGOs combine on climate change as election issue

With an election coming this spring, environmental groups, unions and other provincial organizations are pushing to get the issue of climate change on the political agenda. Judging by what happened during the U.S. presidential election, that is going to be a challenge, says Marc Lee, co-director of the Climate Justice Project, which is run by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. But he and a lot of others think it can be done. More than 50 organizations – including the BC Teachers’ Federation, Pembina Institute, Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs and most of the leading environmental groups in the province – have signed an open letter urging all political parties to support legislated greenhouse gas reduction targets and to set out their climate action policies in election platforms.