On election night, 撸奶社区councillor and Green Party of Canada candidate for MP, Lauren Greenlaw, accepted her loss to the Liberal Party’s Patrick Weiler, but bemoaned that the environment hadn't played a more important part in the discussion in the lead up to the election.
"Last night, as I was driving home from the Earth Day Festival in Roberts Creek, which was so beautiful and amazing, I saw my first ever forest fire in our foothills. And that was the last day of this campaign, a campaign where nobody cared about climate change," Greenlaw said at her election results viewing party.
She is right in the sense that the environment wasn’t often a hot topic during the campaign.
But why?
After all, the vast majority of us know climate change is an issue that has to be addressed.
The signs are all around us.
In January, for example, the was set to 89 seconds to midnight, meaning the world is in trouble, and one of the biggest reasons is the lack of attention to our environment.
(Founded in 1945 by Albert Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and University of Chicago scientists, the Clock is universally recognized as a reflection of the world’s vulnerability to global catastrophe caused by humans.)
"The impacts of climate change increased in the last year as myriad indicators, including sea-level rise and global surface temperature, surpassed previous records," reads the statement about this year's clock setting.
"The global greenhouse gas emissions that drive climate change continued to rise. Extreme weather and other climate change-influenced events—floods, tropical cyclones, heat waves, drought, and wildfires—affected every continent. The long-term prognosis for the world’s attempts to deal with climate change remains poor, as most governments fail to enact the financing and policy initiatives necessary to halt global warming."
To find out why the environment isn't as top of mind as it could be, The 撸奶社区 caught up with UBC political science professor and McLean Family Chair in Canadian Studies, , for her perspective.
What follows is a version of that conversation edited for length and clarity.
Q: As our Green Party candidate noted on election night, the climate didn't play a very big role in the election campaign, which is a pretty big shift from the provincial election, at least in our region. Is this all to do with President Trump's threats to our sovereignty?
A: I think the shift preceded the Trump administration. Most Canadians are concerned about climate change. Most Canadians believe that it's caused by human activity, but it is not usually a top-of-mind issue in politics. That is especially true when folks are worried about their ability to make ends meet, to afford housing, and when their jobs are threatened. Over time within Canada, we have seen these peaks where, every once in a while, the environment, or climate, rises to the top of voters' agendas. There was one peak in about 2007 when the environment was briefly number one in response to survey questions asking, 'What do you think is the most important problem facing Canada today?” I don't think it ever got to the top, but it was one of the top two or three issues in 2019. In the fall of 2019, the kids were marching in the streets. There were 100,000 people who marched in Vancouver, and more than that in Montreal. And then public attention to climate change, and, to a lesser degree, public concern about climate change, was knocked a blow by three things. The first was COVID-19. Suddenly, climate change went from being one of the top issues to falling down the list because people were worried about surviving.
And then there was inflation in 2022 and 2023 that gave rise to the affordability crisis, which you know is still with us—prices are soaring. Partly that was a follow-on effect of the COVID pandemic, but to a large degree, it was Russia's invasion of Ukraine which caused transportation, fuel, and energy prices to shoot up. And there was also, especially in B.C., a concurrent housing shortage that drove prices up.
So, affordability became the top issue on the agenda, pushing climate change further down, and then with the inauguration of Donald Trump and his threatening Canada's economy and even sovereignty, from the polling I've seen, I don't believe climate change was in the Top 10 issues of concern.
If it was getting less attention in the recent federal election, it was because the parties were responding to the issues that were most important to voters. There was quite a bit on the environment in their platforms.
Q: So, is it fair to say, if we're in a heat dome, or it's the middle of summer and wildfires are on our backs and it's more pushed in our faces, we care, but that isn't what is happening right now?
A: In 2021 B.C. was really hit hard by climate change—over 600 people died in the heat dome, there was massive flooding, Vancouver was cut off from the rest of Canada by flooded roads—and yet, if it had an impact on voter priorities, it was very short-lived.
But it is also human behaviour to compare everything with how you are in a given moment, to an extent, against the status quo. And it doesn't help that there's been this language of the "new normal," where people try to imply that climate change is the new normal. But in fact, this is not the new normal. It's going to keep getting warmer until we reach net zero. We get to net zero as soon as we stop adding more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. But I think it is human nature to think, "I'm doing OK right now, and really my immediate concern is affording groceries or housing," and to push off something that is more distant.
Q: Something that happens here in 撸奶社区is that there seems to be some shaming of folks who drive a gas car, for example, or who don't use a reusable cup. Not everyone can afford environmental alternatives, so I am wondering if there is some resistance to the whole environmental movement from that?
A: That is a complicated one, because on one hand, if we are going to fix climate change, it's not going to be just the big polluters. We would all like to believe that this is a problem caused by the oil industry alone, or big industrial polluters. But in fact, in Canada, those big industrial sources of greenhouse gases account for less than half of our emissions, and the other half is small sources, including buildings, motor vehicles, farms, landfills, and so that's going to need to change too.
There's resistance to that; we want to be able to point to someone else. And that's what they've been told. "Don't worry, we'll make big industry pay." And so it feels very unfair to be asked to change our behaviour. On the other hand, we've got folks who are deeply committed and are changing their lives and trying to ride bikes and buy less, and, if they can afford it, install heat pumps and so on. I think they are setting an example for everyone. The challenge is that we are not going to solve this problem by shaming or by looking to individuals to act voluntarily. I applaud those who do act voluntarily, because they demonstrate that one can live a very good life without such a big carbon footprint. But we should not count on that. That's why we need laws. That's why we need regulation of vehicle emissions. That's why we need building codes. That's why we need to regulate what kinds of heating equipment can be installed in buildings. And those are the things that will transform emissions.
We are also seeing governments put a lot of investment into electric vehicle charging networks. There have been subsidies for heat pumps that I think have been quite helpful as well, and, until recently, subsidies for electric vehicles. It takes a mix of carrots and sticks. I think it's good for folks to demonstrate what can be done, but not helpful when anyone's being shamed. But then, I am also struck that sometimes people feel like they're being shamed when no one's actually said anything.
Q: Will the environment also become more of a priority when, say, housing becomes more affordable and the economy is better? Then we can focus on the environment?
A: I mean, the temptation is to say, let's just park climate change for a few years while we deal with this immediate crisis. The problem is, in the meantime, the climate crisis is going to keep getting worse. That's one problem. The other is that the climate crisis is continuing to get worse, will cost us more money and hurt affordability. And the third is some of the short-term economic things that we embrace, like expanding fossil fuel exports to other countries, locking our economy into dependence on fossil fuels at a time when other countries are starting their transition away from buying those energy sources, right? So we can't say, let's ignore the climate and just focus on affordability. Right now, we could take some very short-term solutions that make things worse, both for the climate and affordability and our economy generally.
Q: People blame the politicians, but when it matters to people, they will respond to what people want, right?
A: Absolutely. I also think really good politicians also recognize that voters are busy putting food on the table, you know, trying to get their kids to school on time, trying to keep their jobs, and are not spending their time thinking about what the issues are that are coming. How should the economy be transformed? That's what we elect people to do, and so hopefully they are responding to the immediate concerns, but while they're doing so, they're mindful of the longer term and the broader public interest. And you know, I think they try.
Q: So, are you hopeful?
A: I am consistently hopeful. We can always do better. I found hope in a lot of the Liberal Party’s platform—in a lot of the signals that were embedded in that platform. Prime Minister Mark Carney's government envisions a clean energy future for Canada, and he signalled it would be making the kinds of investments and adopting policies that would hasten that transformation. So, that's a good thing.
And, honestly, it just feels immoral to give up.
I mean, at my age, there's this phenomenon of people saying, “Well, we're screwed anyway.” I find that infuriating because it is such a grotesque expression of privilege.
The people who don't give up are those who are most at risk in Canada and elsewhere in the world. So, you know, I remain hopeful—and I think what we need more than hope is determination.
