Public money (tax dollars) cannot finance the transition to an equitable and thriving planet alone – it is an astronomical cost. The cost to attain the UN Paris Agreement Goals and the UN Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 is estimated to be at least 3 trillion dollars a year globally. The private sector must step in. We need government policies that will redirect financial flows away from fossil fuels in the private sector. Canada’s carbon pricing is one of those policies. We need to protect and improve it while at the same time supporting other policies that will redirect financial flows toward a thriving and equitable planet. Any policy that we support has to be evidence-based, reduce a significant amount of greenhouse gas pollution, not burden the taxpayer and have momentum. In April 2021, New Zealand introduced a law that will force financial firms to assess not only their own investments but also to evaluate the companies to which they are lending money in terms of their environmental impact. It was passed into law in October 2021. Another thing we do is stand behind the climate champions in Parliament. Thus, we are now getting behind Senator Rosa Galvez’s Private Member’s Bill S-243 The Climate-Aligned Finance Act. Akin to the New Zealand law, Bill S-243 would require financial institutions and Crown corporations to: develop action plans and targets; establish a duty of alignment with climate commitments for directors and officers of entities; require the appointment of a person with climate expertise to certain boards of directors; and establish a capital adequacy requirement proportionate to the climate risks generated by financial institutions. Resource: Laser Talk: Why we support the Climate-Aligned Finance Act
CAFA White Paper 2022
