VANCOUVER— One side of the country has been grappling with high gas prices while the other copes with massive flooding.

In reality, these have both been climate stories.

In British Columbia, some drivers are demanding government relief from high gas prices. And indeed, they are historically high — more than $1.70 at some stations in the lower mainland, prices rarely seen anywhere outside Europe.

Meanwhile, Central Canada has seen its second “100-year flood” in three years, forcing numerous municipalities, including the nation’s capital, to declare a state of emergency.

These are stories about climate change. They are not only that, of course, but that is the through line linking headlines across the country.

The questions we should be asking are: what are we willing to do to mitigate and respond to climate change, and what are the costs of our failure to act?

Yet, even as the floodwaters were rising, we heard complaints when climate change was mentioned: “Now is not the time for this conversation. People have suffered too much. Talking about climate only politicizes the tragedy.”

If that refrain sounds familiar, it should. It parallels exactly the message of U.S. gun advocates in the wake of a mass shooting.

In both cases, it’s difficult to interpret it as anything other than a deliberate attempt to paralyze public debate at the exact time minds are most likely to change on a crucial social issue.

In fact, these are all opportunities to have more profound conversations about what we can do in the face of the current realities and future threat posed by climate change.

We owe nothing less to those suffering through flooding than to talk frankly and earnestly about why their homes were damaged or destroyed, and what can be done to prevent it from happening again.

As it happens, the ideal long-term solution to high fuel prices is also the ideal solution to climate change — a progressive transition away from reliance on oil and gas. We need to give Canadians more, but not more of the same. Instead, they need more effective, more accessible and more affordable alternatives to our current high-carbon lifestyles.

For example, rising gas prices are an opportunity, not to limit the effect of the carbon tax but to make good on its promise. It is precisely the short-term pain of higher prices that creates an impetus to make different and more efficient choices.

High gas prices force drivers (myself among them) to rethink our options and perhaps look for cheaper and more environmentally sustainable possibilities. No single solution will work for every situation. Instead, we need to give those feeling the pinch at the pump a better range of transportation choices: everything from increased bus and rail service to low-emissions car exchange programs to safer bike lanes to more walkable communities.

Rather than talking about ways to place a cap on price increases, we should be talking about ways to use the money collected, and whatever other revenues we need, to make choice-enhancing investments in transportation alternatives. “Zap, you’re frozen” didn’t fix anything in 1974, and it won’t fix anything today.

There is much to be done beyond transportation as well. In Vancouver, for instance, city council recently unanimously passed a new climate response plan explicitly intended to push the envelope as to what is possible for a municipality to achieve. The proposals include progressive limits on everything from the use of natural gas in home heating and cooking to the amount of cement used in building new homes. The changes are difficult but doable, and an example of what determined and thoughtful municipal policy-making can realistically accomplish.

In Ontario, meanwhile, the province recently cut in half its funding for flood management in the province’s conservation areas. As a result, the damage from the next flood will be that much more severe in affected areas and recovery that much more costly.

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We need to have conversations about these policy choices across the country, for they are all connected to the same underlying set of challenges. All governments in this country, regardless of partisan stripe, should have two goals. First, they need to give Canadians viable alternatives to their current high-carbon choices. Second, they must institute policies that will help Canadians deal with the realities of an already changing climate.

Canada cannot solve climate change alone. As one of the world’s worst per-capita carbon emitters, it is a part of the problem, however. The country also has much to offer as part of a global solution. In the meantime, we must take measures to adapt in the face of changes already occurring. These are monumental challenges; we owe it to Canadians currently suffering to talk about them now.

Stewart Prest is a lecturer in political science at Simon Fraser University

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