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OTTAWA — The Harper government could do more for the environment and sustainable development if it worked with stakeholders to take politics out of the debate, says a federal advisory panel.
In a report released Thursday, the government advisory panel and an independent research organization said that many important policies are being abandoned because of an “adversarial and confrontational” debate with environmental groups and the business community.
“If governments and stakeholders are to align their activities around common goals, they must learn to make decisions together, rather than control — or cajole — one another,” said the report, Progress through Process. “It makes sense to establish a process that allows government to exercise that leadership and bring people together to help them fulfil it.”
The report, jointly produced by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy along with the Public Policy Forum, said that all governments in Canada must share their policy-making authority and collaborate with those with a vested interest to develop policies and exchange information.
The advice comes a few months after the Harper government was slammed by provincial governments and environmentalists during international climate change negotiations last December in Copenhagen.
The standoff reached a climax during a heated verbal exchange captured by television cameras at the conference when a spokesperson for Prime Minister Stephen Harper accused an environmentalist of organizing a prank to embarrass the government. It was subsequently revealed that the environmentalist, Steven Guilbeault from Equiterre, had nothing to do with the prank.
“On many fronts — climate change, energy, land-use, water, urban development, and others — progress gets bogged down by entrenched interests and adversarial posturing,” said the report. “Governments, which need to take decisions, must navigate between competing claims and deliver on their electoral commitments while upholding the public interest.”
The round table is an independent advisory panel to the Canadian government made up of representatives from environmental groups and the business community. The Public Policy Forum is an independent, not-for-profit, Canadian research organization.
The two organizations prepared the report following a series of interviews and discussions with representatives from industry, governments and environmental groups last fall.
“We need to find better ways of aligning or integrating interests in ways that lead to sustainable development,” said the report. “Otherwise, it will prove enduringly difficult to overcome the polarization and lack of trust that too often permeates environment-economy discussions.”
In one case study from the report, Karen Farbridge, the mayor of Guelph, Ont., said consultations on a growth strategy for the city helped engage citizens to participate in the process.
“It helped that the engagement strategies were rewarding and even fun for those involved, enabling citizens to feel a sense of shared responsibility and vision for their community,” said the report.
From the business community, Gord Lambert, the vice-president of sustainable development at Suncor, said that an alliance of stakeholders created in the 1990s to promote clean air in Alberta, also met its objectives by organizing a clear process to address the relevant issues.
But the report also noted that the process can still spark some resistance, even in the southern Ontario city of Guelph, where some residents opposed the urban development plans and felt they had not been consulted.
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