Skip to content

OUR VIEW: Needed: A superhero to save the planet

We’ve gotta take our collective editorial hat off to Andrew Weaver. Weaver, the B.C. Green Party MLA representing Oak Bay-Gordon Head, can always be counted on to remind us why we need to have some non-Liberal, non-NDP voices in the legislature.

We’ve gotta take our collective editorial hat off to Andrew Weaver.

Weaver, the B.C. Green Party MLA representing Oak Bay-Gordon Head, can always be counted on to remind us why we need to have some non-Liberal, non-NDP voices in the legislature.

Weaver did his part to shake up Christy Clark’s summer sitting of the legislature by arguing that the house should, in fact, cease other business for an emergency debate on how the province is responding to climate change.

Weaver invoked the rarely used Standing Order 35, which is reserved for issues of “urgent public importance.” He said the legislature needs to decide whether it is “acting with sufficient urgency and demonstrating the appropriate leadership on preparing for and mitigating the escalating impacts of climate change on our province.”

He pointed out, quite rightly, that B.C. has been seeing all kinds of signs of climate change.

“We are experiencing forest fires, fishing bans, water restrictions and air quality advisories all occurring at alarming rates,” he said in a statement. “In the backdrop of everything that is going on right now, there are few issues more urgent or of greater public importance than the actions we need to take immediately to tackle climate change.”

It’s probably not surprising that the other parties were less than enthusiastic about the idea.

Christy Clark’s Liberals weren’t about to get derailed from their single-track  agenda to save the provincial economy through liquefied natural gas.

And the NDP? Well, their response was as non-offensively middle-of-the-road as you might expect – acknowledging the importance of a climate change debate but suggesting the fall session might be a more appropriate time for it.

Did Weaver genuinely think he had a shot at convincing them otherwise?

We suspect not.

But kudos to him for making a point of forcing the rest of the house to stop and think about an issue that is, genuinely, the most critical issue facing our province – and our planet – today.

Sure, it was playing a bit of politics to introduce the idea as an emergency debate; arguably, there’s very little the government could do in the next couple of months that can’t be dealt with in the fall sitting.

But it’s become increasingly clear that our planet needs a superhero to stick up for it – and it seems to have fallen to Weaver to be that person for the B.C. legislature.

Here’s hoping he’ll be joined by a few more colleagues after the next provincial election so everyone starts taking climate issues more seriously.