HALIFAX—As the legislature reconvened for its fall sitting, Nova Scotia’s premier called an emergency debate on climate change with the hope of getting all-party feedback and support for new a provincial environmental strategy, which is expected this fall.

Premier Stephen McNeil made a motion for the debate as one of his first orders of business at the legislature on Thursday afternoon. The house dedicated two hours to the debate later the same day — the eve of global climate strikes, branches of which are expected to attract thousands in Halifax and around the province.

A handful of concerned citizens even turned out early, chanting outside Province House for an end to the use of “dirty coal” while legislators debated within.

McNeil said he called the debate because climate change is an issue of global importance, and with consultation for updated environmental goals underway, he wanted to hear from opposition members.

Nova Scotia’s Environmental Goals and Sustainable Prosperity Act is 12 years old and two years overdue for renewal, but the province promises either new or amended legislation to be introduced this sitting.

The department of environment revealed in August its objectives and the areas its new legislation would focus on, including cleaner energy, mitigating climate change and adapting to its inevitable impacts. It invited the public to email feedback, the deadline for which is Friday.

McNeil said the debate folds into that consultation process.

“My hope is that with constructive ideas that comes from the opposite side, if they work with the bill we’ll be able to put them in so that all members of this house can support what the next decade looks like in protecting the environment and growing the economy of Nova Scotia,” McNeil told reporters after starting the debate with about eight minutes of prepared remarks.

He said to members of the house that Friday’s strikes would bring “the rallying cries of young people to ensure that those of us who have the privilege to hold elected office in this province deal with the challenges of ensuring that we leave them with a province and a country and a globe that is a sustainable one that is healthier than it is today.”

He promised more ambitious targets, but offered no specifics, deferring to the upcoming legislation.

Asked what he thought of the last-minute debate, NDP Leader Gary Burrill said in the context of the climate crisis and the global climate strike, “certainly, it makes all kinds of sense.”

“Every statement, every commitment, every focus that can be given to the world’s great challenge of holding global warming to 1.5 degrees in the next 11 years is a welcome contribution,” he told reporters.

But he had some misgivings about the province’s consultation on the expected environmental strategy.

“We have had all kinds of concerns that the consultations about this have been put off and forestalled and put off as long as they have to the point where now, on this hugely important subject, all we’re having in Nova Scotia, by way of consultation, is a brief couple of weeks online over two or three questions.”

He said a climate action plan is “far too important a matter to leave late, to delay or to scrunch up and I think the government has made a mistake in leaving the consultation this late and trying to do it in such a compressed way.”

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Burrill’s party has been calling for a reduction to Nova Scotia’s greenhouse gas emissions to 50 per cent below 1990 levels by 2030.

Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Houston said the debate was “appropriate,” although his party doesn’t have any clear climate targets of its own. He said he suspected the McNeil government called the emergency debate, in part, to avoid talking about health care.

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