Speaking to Alberta Teachers’ Association, Tzeporah Berman says Canadians deserve meaningful debate on climate change

After being invited to speak today at the Alberta Teachers’ Association Conference, environmental advocate Tzeporah Berman called out elected leaders and the oil industry for preventing a meaningful conversation on climate change at a time when Canada cannot meet its climate targets by allowing the continued expansion of oil sands.

Traditional territory of the Enoch Cree Nation (Edmonton, AB) — After being invited to speak today at the Alberta Teachers’ Association Conference, environmental advocate and Stand.earth deputy director Tzeporah Berman called out elected leaders and the oil industry for preventing a meaningful conversation on climate change at a time when Canada cannot meet its climate targets by allowing the continued expansion of oil sands. You can read the full speech here.

“We cannot remain this polarized around the future of oil sands development and expect to make progress on climate,” she said. “To suggest a gradual reduction in productions gets you called anti-Canadian and marginalized as an extremist and there goes a healthy debate. That’s the power of the oil industry, often supported by elected officials. It’s an absurd place we’ve reached, but for the sake of our children and their children’s future, for the sake of the planet, we must do better.”

After hearing of Berman’s speech, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley announced she would also attend and speak in order to “counter misinformation.” Opposition Leader Jason Kenney has heavily criticized the Alberta Teachers’ Association, stating that it was wrong for them to invite an address from environmentalist Berman.

In her speech to the teachers, Berman called these accusations by elected officials “disingenuous simplistic dog whistle politics that serve to foment fear and anger instead of taking us forward towards solutions so we can adapt to the new global reality of climate change.”

Referring to the continuing growth in the oil sands, Berman said, “The math doesn’t add up. We cannot meet our climate commitments while emissions continue to rise. We have to stop ignoring the reality that emissions will have to go down. We can’t do this unles we acknowledge that the oil sands are big enough already.” 

She added, “The world’s energy and transportation systems are changing, right now. Even China and India are moving away from fossil fuel cars. We need a real plan to start diversifying our economy and creating jobs now if we want to avoid being left behind.”

Watch a livestream of the speech at https://www.facebook.com/standearth/videos/2254824498071220/.

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Media contact: Tzeporah Berman, Deputy Director, Stand.earth, tzeporah@stand.earth, 604-313-4713