Former Ontario Liberal MP Dan McTeague came out swinging against the recently-announced Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, calling it “crap,” “nonsensical,” and “bizarre.".Representatives of nearly 200 countries assembled at the United Nations’ COP15 meetings on biodiversity in Montreal reached a draft agreement on December 19. The signatories agreed to set aside 30% of all land and water for conservation, slash pollution from soil nutrients and pesticides, curb over consumption, and spend billions of dollars annually on sustainability..McTeague, founder and president of Canadians For Affordable Energy, sees the framework as another scheme to create scarcity and reduce the standard of living..“This crap again? What's the matter with people? Are they really bored? Because if it isn't the great reset, if it isn't a just transition, there's a thousand things. These are people looking for an opportunity to justify their own existence and to go to these kinds of summits and come up with these cool trendy ideas, which at the end of the day, are really predicated on pure nonsense,” McTeague said in an interview..“The reality is that more than 90% of our country is untouched, unspoiled. And that includes the water and includes the landmass. How much have we committed to national parks? What are we really talking about here other than a transfer of wealth to provide gratification for those who believe that somehow we have sinned against the planet?”.The agreement cites a $700 billion annual funding gap for its goals. It identifies $200 billion in new spending which would come from both public and private sources, of which $30 billion would go to developing countries. The framework also alleges $500 billion annually subsidizes oil and gas, unsustainable agriculture, and other practices, and calls for this money to be redirected to sustainability initiatives..McTeague doubts Canadians will welcome the bill..“[We] will probably see the federal government bend over backwards to try to accommodate these things, but I'm not so sure Canadians are on board with borrowing money to send money to other parts of the world,” he said..The agreement includes four sets of goals and 23 targets, ones McTeague says are hazy at best and misguided at worst..“I just wonder where these folks come from because if you had mentioned this particular conference a nanosecond before it began, no one would have known what it was what it was all about. But of course, these things are always done with this gleeful idea that you can make these kinds of commitments without anyone really understanding what the commitments entail,” he said..“We need a little bit more idea of what is being proposed here and the implications. But I can assure you that if something was rushed, or something that was once considered years ago to be extravagant, far fetched, usually there's a reason for that.”.Target 7 calls for “preventing, reducing, and working towards eliminating plastic pollution., yet, McTeague doubts the petroleum product is our enemy..“If you're saying we should eliminate plastics, or you can consider plastic to be pollution, then what's the substitute? Brown paper bags? What do they call them, cartons thingy boxy?”.No, that’s “drink box water bottle sort of thing,” or so said the prime minister, who charged taxpayers $500 annually for them..“We don't need some kind of ratification on something that is nonsensical. Show me and make the case that plastics hasn't improved our society. I remember as a kid walking into water and cutting my feet with glass. You don't do that anymore with the revolution in plastics. Plastics are used for everything from Medicare, to protecting society, to making things lighter, to making vehicles more efficient, to making our lives that much more manageable.”.On Twitter, Federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault called the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework an “historic deal to protect nature and biodiversity” and “a major win for our planet and all of humanity.” The next day, December 20, he banned the manufacture and import of plastic straws, checkout bags, cutlery, stir sticks, and food service ware..McTeague, who was a Liberal MP for 18 years, said he believes there’s a gap between the perspectives and objectives of COP15 participants like Guilbeault and everyday people. He said the latter “might be aghast” if they knew what the framework really meant for their lives..“These [COP15] people are out of whack and out of proportion with reality. And if people have subscribed to this kind of stuff, that's because they've got an angle, whether it's a financial angle, or whether they're just the types of people that we have, like Mr. Guilbeault, who is too busy spending his time protesting and getting himself arrested for the kind of stunts that really have no effect other than to remind people of just how out of touch some of these individuals are there.".“It's make-work projects for them. Probably, if they got what they wanted overnight, as bizarre as it is, they'd still be looking for something even weirder to try to promote. Most people have no time for their nonsense. And those who do, frankly, should, let me be very blunt, get a job.”.In the same breath as “pollution risks,” Target 7 also calls for “excess nutrients lost to the environment” and “risk from pesticides and highly hazardous chemicals” to be reduced by at least half. Target 16 aims to “reduce the global footprint of consumption in an equitable manner, halve global food waste, significantly reduce over-consumption and substantially reduce waste generation, in order for all people to live well in harmony with Mother Earth.”.McTeague said the framework incorporates the ideas of Thomas Malthus, who believed production could not keep up with growth in the human population, resulting in disease, famine, war, and calamity. By contrast, McTeague believes the framework itself threatens to lower the quality of life for Canadians and people elsewhere..“Here we go to the next step of being controlled. Is it that we believe the real challenge to our society is there's too many people? We don't have to go down this path of saying humans are bad, humans consume too much, and go eat insects as a solution, which is what this sounds like,” McTeague said..“I guess what it comes down to is they don't have a problem with the environment, they don't have a problem with all of these objectives. They have a problem with people. That's what it's really about.”
