Our welcome letter to the new Federal Government Cabinet Ministers

June 3, 2025

On May 13, 2025 Prime Minister Mark Carney appointed his first cabinet. The decisions that this group makes over the next four years will have consequences for decades to come, including determining whether Canada will act to cut our climate pollution, protect people from the devastating impacts of climate change that we’re already living through, and invest in a thriving, green economy for all. This letter is our message to those Ministers:

Dear incoming Cabinet Ministers,

On behalf of Stand.earth, I am writing to extend our congratulations on your appointments.

Stand.earth is a Vancouver-based global organization with a team of policy and issue experts focused on building a sustainable, climate-safe future for all. Our work in Canada includes advocating for strong climate policies, an energy transition away from polluting fossil fuels towards clean renewables, protection of irreplaceable old-growth forests and the at-risk species they sustain, and the creation of good, green jobs under a framework of Indigenous rights and strong social safeguards.

We look forward to working together to address the unprecedented challenges that Canada is currently facing.

As you identify important economic and development priorities, we encourage you to keep front and center the environmental and social protections that are a core value of Canadian society. Rather than follow our neighbours to the south in a race to the bottom under the guise of ‘fast tracking,’ we urge you to take a more responsible path and invest in shovel-ready projects that also tackle the existential threat of climate change, make our communities more resilient, and create hundreds of thousands of good, green jobs while strengthening Canada’s economy.

There are many such projects ready to go, and we encourage you to prioritize strategic investments in:

Millions of green, energy-efficient and affordable homes
A resilient east-west electricity grid
Renewable energy and battery storage
Scaled-up public transportation, from regional rapid transit to cross-country high-speed rail
A domestic heat pump and solar industry
A national-scale energy efficiency program
Electric charging infrastructure for heavy industry including ports
Programs to transition northern communities off diesel to renewables

All of these projects, if developed in close consultation with climate experts and under a framework that upholds Indigenous decision-making authority in line with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, could help Canada meet our international climate and nature protection commitments while creating good, long term jobs, making life more affordable for everyday people, and contributing to diversified, domestic economic growth.

At the same time, we urge you to avoid dangerous distractions that will only profit big polluters and put our climate and nature protection targets further out of reach. We are calling on your Ministry and government to:

Ensure the biggest polluters rapidly reduce their emissions and pay their fair share:

Protect important pieces of environmental legislation passed by the previous Liberal government, including the Impact Assessment Act and the updated Competition Act.
Move swiftly to finalize a strong cap on oil and gas sector carbon emissions.
Finalize federal oil and gas methane regulations.
End all fossil fuel subsidies including through Export Development Canada financing.

Build new homes according to strong green standards from the start:

Require that all new buildings (including those developed or financed through Build Canada Homes) use modern heating technologies such as electric heat pumps – which are significantly less polluting than antiquated fossil fuel systems and improve health and safety by providing cooling in the summer and reducing indoor air pollution.
Top up funding for country-wide retrofits with a focus on direct installation of all-electric heat pumps to address building pollution, the third largest source of emissions in the country.

Catalyze investments into sustainable industries and away from fossil fuels:

Advance a gas-free green taxonomy to help spur truly sustainable investment.
Mandate climate risk disclosure for Canadian companies to match other jurisdictions.
Pursue incentives including blended finance, matching grants and lower interest and de-risked loans to spur investments in the projects and programs listed above.
Restrict further subsidies, loan backstops and other taxpayer funded support to fossil fuel expansion projects including via Export Development Canada and the Canada Account.

Follow through on commitments to protect irreplaceable forests and at-risk species:

Work with provincial and Indigenous governments to make rare, old and at-risk forests off limits to logging while supporting Indigenous-led land use visions and protected areas plans.
Immediately end all subsidies and support for the dangerous distraction of forest biomass energy, including the export of wood pellets and domestic utility-scale power generation. Burning biomass to generate electricity emits as much or more CO2 per unit of energy than coal at the smokestack.
Address the worsening extinction crisis including by upholding your legal responsibilities under the Species at Risk Act to protect the habitat of endangered species like southern mountain caribou.

We look forward to hearing your perspectives on the top priorities for your Ministries, and working together with a spirit of mutual respect and collaboration to achieve our shared goals.

Sincerely,

Liz McDowell

Senior Campaigns Director, Stand.earth

liz@stand.earth

(May, 2025)

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