Shawn McCarthy

OTTAWA — The Globe and Mail

All Liberal cabinet ministers have been charged with ensuring the success of the new government’s commitments on climate change, Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion said in an interview Wednesday as he prepares to engage the country’s diplomatic corps in the international fight against global warming.

A veteran climate warrior, Mr. Dion will play a pivotal role in the Liberal government’s climate agenda, both as minister for global affairs and as chair of the cabinet committee on environment, climate change and energy. He is expected to join Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Environment Minister Catherine McKenna at the Paris climate summit at the end of the month, though he would not confirm his attendance on Wednesday.

Mr. Trudeau signalled a heightened commitment when he appointed his cabinet last week by adding the words “climate change” to the name of the Environment Ministry, a move that raised some concerns in Calgary’s battered oil industry. But Mr. Dion said that the effort will be much broader, suggesting all major economic decisions will face a climate-change test.

“The old system was to give the file of the environment to the minister of environment and say to her or him, ‘Deal with it, be the hero of the environmental groups but don’t bother us because we have jobs to create and an economy to grow,’” he said. “That will not work. … [Ms. McKenna] will succeed only if all of us [in cabinet] have a green orientation and sensitivity.”

Mr. Dion served as environment minister under former prime minister Paul Martin, and he controversially campaigned on a proposed carbon tax when he was Liberal leader in the 2008 election in which the Conservatives secured their second minority government. He is clearly thrilled to be back in a position where he can pursue an environmental agenda.

full story at http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/entire-liberal-cabinet-responsible-for-climate-change-agenda-dion/article27224782/