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Pat No FUN Hh ane ; INSIDE LOOK

Despite winning the Grey Cup at home, coach Wally
Buono and the B.C. Lions get no outdoor parade

MLA GETS A TASTE OF WELFARE........2

Jagrup Brar to live on $610 for a month

HOT DATES FOR COLD WEATHER........5

Romantic winter plans to warm your

s\\

sweeties’s heart

urge federal
government
not to toss

Kyoto pretocol

Canada could °

By JEN ST. DENIS

anada could derail international

climate change negotiations if it

pulls out of the Kyoto Protocol,

according to the David Suzuki
Foundation.

It was reported Sunday that Canada
would pull out of the Kyoto Protocol at
the end of December. However, Envi-
ronment Minister Peter Kent would not
confirm or deny the reports. Countries
are meeting now in Durban, South Af-
rica to try to come to an agreement on
cutting emissions.

“Tt’s been very clear from the devel-
oping countries, especially [...] India,
South Africa, Brazil and China, that the
negotiations have to include the Kyoto
Protocol,” said Dale Marshall, an ana-
lyst at the David Suzuki Foundation. “It
doesn’t bode well for an international
agreement that has all countries mov-
ing in the same direction to tackle cli-
mate change.

“For Canada to pull out, basically it

has a real chance of scuttling any prog-
ress that could be made short-term
with respect to these negotiations,”
said Marshall.

Most developing countries and the
European Union support the Kyoto Pro-
tocol, said Matt Horne, climate policy
director at the Pembina Institute.

“Although bigger countries and big-
ger sources of emissions [than Canada]
are always going to be important [in
negotiations], Canada playing a non-
constructive role has impact,” said
Horne.

Kent has called the Kyoto Protocol
outdated. Canada has not met its Kyoto
emissions targets for the period be-
tween 2008 to 2012, which called for an-
nual emissions to fall six per cent below
1990 emissions levels. Instead, they
have risen 17 per cent.

“The science is pretty settled. We
know that the climate is sensitive to
C02 levels,” said Philip Austin, an earth
and ocean sciences professor at the
University of British Columbia, “so

scuttle Kyoto: |
Suzuki Foundation

Climate scientists

photo courtesy flickr creative commons, Gerard Van der Leun
With climate talks continuing at an international conference in South Africa, questions swirl about Canada abandoning Kyoto.

66

pulling out of Kyoto and doing nothing
is really just an invitation to create a
huge experiment.”

But Hadi Dowlatabadi, a professor in
sustainable development at UBC, said
that Canada’s participation in the cli-
mate change agreement was problem-
atic from the start because the United
States, the largest emitter of green-
house gas emissions and Canada’s larg-
est trading partner, did not ratify the
agreement in 1997.

“What the Harper government is do-
ing now is putting that right and then
they'll just trot on behind their bigger
brother,” said Dowlatabadi, “and what-
ever the big brother decides to do, the
Harper government will decide to do.”

The Conservative government an-
nounced Monday that they would be
investing $600 million over five years to
renew the Clean Air Regulatory Agen-
da. According to a government press
release, the money will be used to
“align greenhouse gas regulations with
the United States where appropriate.”

For
Canada to
pull out,
basically it
has areal
chance of
scuttling
any
progress
that could
be made

DALE MARSHALL,
spokesman for
the David Suzuki
Foundation

Students
frustrated by
tight window
for U-Pass
renewal

Transit users going home
for the holidays may have
difficulty getting their
January passes

By LYNDA CHAPPLE

fast if they need their January U-
Passes over the holidays.

The passes will be available during a
four-day window Dec. 19-22, when the
college closes for holidays until Jan. 3.

That means out-of-town students re-
turning after Christmas will likely be
without a valid pass until they get back
to the school.

Raymond Yeung, Langara’s U-Pass
and transportation coordinator, said
the pick-up dates are the same every
month, and the college didn’t want to
change them just for December.

“Tf [students] don’t want to lose use
on the first, second and third of Janu-
ary they need to come by December 22
to pick up their passes,” said Yeung.

But students aren’t happy.

“It is kind of annoying. I start work
through the holidays and my last exam
is the 13th, now I have to come back
sometime in that window,” said Whit-
ney Brennan, a second-year arts and
science transfer student. “It is kind of
inconvenient for people.”

Brennan would have preferred the
cards were available earlier than Dec.
19, as they are in every other month.

Js UePASS

Les students will have to act

dates in Decem-
ber are there
and available but

Robertson calls out province on housing

fast enough to carry its share of

Vancouver By DANIEL PALMER
not happy ayor Gregor Robertson said the
with tardy ME: government is not acting
fi unding funding for critical homeless shelters
from the this winter.
. Robertson made the remarks yester-
Pp rovince, day after holding a joint press confer-
calling B.C. ence with B.C. Housing Minister Rich
«ary? Coleman at the McLaren Housing Soci-
A Ousing Ss ety. Coleman and Robertson were on
extreme hand to announce the construction of a
supportive housing project for individ-
weather uals who are HIV-positive.
response “At this point, we don’t have a com-
mitment of any funding for the winter
shelters a shelters,” said Robertson.
Band-Aid

fix’

Robertson said the city has no means
of funding the shelters without provin-
cial help.

“We're still hopeful and talking to
the premier about this as well because
it’s a critical need for the city. We had

Provincial
HOMELESS
DANIEL PALMER photo
Robertson calls for faster funding.

that capacity the last two winters. The
housing is coming, but it’s not coming
fast enough,” Robertson said.

Coleman was not available to com-
ment on Robertson’s remarks.

There are currently 1,106 year-
round shelter spaces in Vancouver and
44 seasonal spaces. For the past two
years, the province had funded an ad-
ditional 160 seasonal spaces through
the winter, but that funding is not be-
ing offered this year.

“The city provides the buildings, and
we're happy to do that,” Robertson
said, “The operating costs are the re-
sponsibility of the province. That is
their jurisdiction.”

BC Housing has noted that addition-
al funding is being allocated to Ex-
treme Weather Response shelters,
which are opened when the tempera-
ture is cold enough to cause death.

But City of Vancouver housing advo-
cate Judy Graves called the extreme
weather response shelters a Band-Aid
fix to the housing crisis.

“The extreme weather strategy is
not sustainable for more than a few
days,” Graves told The Voice by email.

may require stu- dates:
dents to plan

ahead,” says Nov. 30
Yeung. November U-

If students are
under a crunch
to get the card,
there are three
dispensers they
can turn to on
campus; the li-
brary, the book-
store and the
Students’ Union
Building.

The bookstore
or the library
dispensers may
be best the best
option as the
Langara SUB
closes Dec. 21.

The January
U-Passes are
available from
Dec. 19 until Jan.
16.

Passes expire

Dec. 19

First day to get
January U-Pass

Dec. 22

Last day to get
January U-Pass,
College closes for
holidays

Dec. 31

December U-
Passes expire

Jan. 3

College re-opens
for spring semester

Source: Langara.be.ca