An accidentally leaked Conservative speech revealed on Tuesday night key details of the government's long-awaited national environmental initiative.
Details of the plan became public after a speech that Environment Minister John Baird was to deliver this week was faxed by mistake to the opposition Liberals on Tuesday.
"This was a prepositioning speech I was to give either today or tomorrow before the announcement," Baird told CTV's Canada AM.
"We're going to be coming forward with a real package to regulate Canadian industry -- the 700 biggest industrial emitters in Canada for both pollution and for greenhouse gases."
The speech was mistakenly faxed to the wrong fax machine, he said.
"A administrative mistake was made at my office. It was to be faxed to the government lobby and it was inadvertently faxed to the opposition lobby," Baird said.
Titled the "Turning the Corner plan," the blueprint reveals various environmental measures.
"The previous government was never able to put on the brakes,'' the speech says. "We will do that beginning today.''
The plan intends to:
- stop the rise of greenhouse gases in three to five years;
- then cut greenhouse gas emissions by 150 million tonnes -- or 20 per cent of current emissions -- by 2020;
- impose targets on industry so that air pollution is cut in half by 2015;
- ban inefficient incandescent lightbulbs; and;
- require home appliances to be more energy efficient and reducing harmful substances in homes and in workplaces.
Industries will be able to make in-house reductions, take advantage of domestic emissions trading, and use the Clean Development Mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol, among other initiatives.
Companies that have cut their greenhouse gas emissions prior to 2006 will also be rewarded with a one-time credit for early action.
As well as exploring domestic trading, the government will examine future linkages with emissions trading systems in the U.S. and possibly Mexico.
The accidental leak left the Conservatives scrambling to deal with an embarrassing breach of secrecy.
Liberal Environment Critic David McGuinty told reporters in a hurried, impromptu news conference Tuesday night that he got the speech after it arrived at the opposition lobby fax machine around 4:30 p.m. EDT.
A page handed him the fax as he was sitting in the House of Commons.
A second fax quickly followed, addressed "to whom it may concern." That fax warned anyone who received the speech was in possession of confidential documents sent in error. Releasing that information could constitute an offence under securities laws, McGuinty said.
"What we do know is the telephone number is the confirmed number in the environment minister's office," he said.
McGuinty said it's possible the document could have been faxed to Bay Street or Wall Street. Because it arrived at a public machine, there's no telling who else might have seen it, he said.
McGuinty called on Baird to make a statement and release details before the markets opened in case traders obtained the information and profited from it.
The document has been sealed and given to the House of Commons' sergeant at arms, he said.
While McGuinty did not reveal the contents, he said the speech for Baird was dated April 25.
The Liberal MP later turned over the faxed speech to the RCMP, reports the Canadian Press.
Under pressure to explain, the government released the text just before midnight.
A government official initially insisted it contained no revelations.
The contents were intended to be made public on Wednesday, before the official announcement by Baird on Thursday -- so there is "nothing in it that affects the markets," the official told CP.
But the text of the speech revealed several previously unannounced details about the government's emission reduction plan.
"There are percentages, there are predicted cuts, there are all kinds of things in this document that could lead one to conclude that there could be some risk in this," McGuinty told CP in a later interview.
Baird's office played down the leak, saying the speech sets up an announcement on Thursday.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Baird are scheduled to announce new limits on heavy polluters in Thornhill, Ont. on Thursday.
"What we're going to see on Thursday will be specific short-term cuts and the penalties that will be imposed on industry, and this is going to have a very significant impact on major sectors across the economy," CTV's Ottawa Bureau Chief Robert Fife reported.
The oil patch, the auto industry and coal-fired electrical plants, for example, may be impacted, Fife added.
The decision to divulge the information in a lock-up suggests it could affect financial markets, Fife said.
"Journalists will be locked up to get the information and it will only be released when the stock market is closed down on Thursday."
With a report from the Canadian Press
