Hon Jim Prentice, MP

Minister of the Environment
House of Commons
Ottawa ON K1A 0A6

(insert current date)

Dear Mr Prentice

Congratulations on your appointment as environment minister . This is a challenging role today when the impacts of global environmental degradation have profound effects on the economy and health. The mitigation of climate change will require massive changes to the way energy is delivered and will result in dramatic changes to the economy. The environment post is a crucial one.

We support aggressive measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, beginning with market mechanisms such as a carbon tax and cap and trade, which should be economy wide, revenue neutral and capable of meeting or bettering the targets set by the Intergovernmental Panel on climate Change.

Canada must respect its international commitments. It should ideally play a leadership role in international negotiations, pushing for strong emission cuts rather than lobbying to weaken the international consensus.

We note that the three opposition parties in Parliament have stronger positions on climate action that your government does. If votes for the Greens are included, we see that a very good majority of Canadians voted for parties supporting stronger action on the climate crisis.

Given the choice between a weak Conservative plan on climate change and a strong one supported by the other three parties in Parliament many Canadians, we believe, would support a coalition.

Yours sincerely

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