Green Party MP at COP26 sees climate change 'commitments' being made but not backed by science
CBC
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Green Party MP Mike Morrice says despite the chaos he's witnessed while at the UN climate change summit in Glasgow, he hopes to see countries make tangible and ambitious commitments to address global environmental concerns.
Morrice, a rookie member of Parliament from the Ontario riding of Kitchener Centre, is among Canadians attending the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
In an interview with CBC Kitchener-Waterloo's The Morning Edition on Wednesday, he said the event that began Sunday so far is "just chaos."
"You have thousands and thousands of people. The last two days have been a summit of world leaders and so, at one point Prince Charles is walking by on one side, and I saw Greta a half-hour later," he said, referring to Swedish youth activist Greta Thunberg.
"But amidst all of that chaos is also negotiating teams who are here to work on the tech on moving forward on the last agreement from Paris five years ago, to update that to move toward implementation to actually figure out the details."
Morrice said he's heard concerns the summit will end without any real progress.
Thunberg herself said COP26 is like previous conferences and "they have led us nowhere." She argued the politicians were just "pretending" to take concerns about the climate seriously.
Morrice believes "there's good reason for some folks to be concerned."
"There's a real mix of commitments being made and nothing that gets close to hitting the science yet," Morrice said.
Although representatives from almost 200 countries are at COP26, Russia and China, two of the world's biggest polluters, opted out of attending.
But, he added, it's encouraging to take note of the thousands of climate activists, young people and Indigenous leaders in Scotland who are "putting a spotlight" on issues important to them.
They "are saying we expect more from you, that this needs to be government policy that needs to change," he said.
"Ultimately, we need to see both our Canadian federal government and others around the world, and not everyone's even here ... push and advocate to do more," Morrice said.
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