This fall, Third Age Barrie,…

This fall, Third Age Barrie, A Lifelong Learning Association, organized a lecture series on Climate Change. On September 25th, we were privileged to hear an enlightening lecture by Dianne Saxe, the Environmental Commissioner of Ontario. Her lecture made us painfully aware of our ongoing contribution to the environmental crisis now facing our province, our country and the rest of our world. To this point, we’ve been somewhat aware of the increasingly dangerous situation we are in, but, somehow expected our government and public institutions to deal with it. Commissioner Saxe made it uncomfortably clear that we are all contributors, and, as such, must share the responsibility for dealing with it. Ultimately, it concerns the survival of our families and communities. While we must do our share, we cannot succeed without the support and leadership of our governments.

We were shocked to learn that the members of the Conservative Government did not attend Commissioner Saxe’s 2018 Climate Action in Ontario report to our government on the morning of September 25 – she spoke to our group in the afternoon of the same day. We were also amazed to be made aware of the fact that our present government has cancelled all the environmental initiatives of the previous government. Many of these programs were having a remedial effect on the environment- even encouraging small businesses to take initiatives in this process. Of particular concern, is the government’s Bill 4, the Cap and Trade Cancellation act. While this bill created some initial confusion and controversy – especially among the major polluters - we understand that it was effective and raised funds to support other environmental programs. We understand that there is one billion dollars still available in the Cap & Trade fund which can still be used for further remediation. We trust that this money will be used for that purpose.