On Parliament Hill

I am pleased and proud to congratulate the city of Steinbach on retaining its title as the “Cleanest City in North America.”

According to the Canadian Beverage Container Recycling Association: “Steinbach… has cut its beverage container litter by another 50%. The numbers were already remarkably low and Steinbach has done even better in 2019. It’s quite an amazing story.”

The CBCRA notes that Steinbach – already a very clean city when they began their audits in 2013 – has further reduced its litter by 85% in the past six years.

Much of the credit for this accolade belongs to the churches of Steinbach, that arrange, facilitate and execute the annual “Pick Up and Walk” campaign each spring.

This past May, some 2,000 volunteers picked up approximately 10 tonnes of garbage!

Aside from the obvious aesthetic impact, litter degrades the soil, poses hazards to animal and plant life and spoils water quality. Something as simple as cleaning up litter can have a huge impact on our environment.

The environment is certainly a top issue these days. We hear of climate protests, disaster scenarios and multi-trillion dollar “Green New Deals” being proposed. While protests may impact our emotions, they do very little to improve our environment. Nothing gets results like individual Canadians, coming together, rolling up their sleeves and getting to work in a practical way in their communities.

Moreover, in the case of Pick Up and Walk, Steinbach residents saved their local government some $50,000 of taxpayer money, proving that green solutions, when done right, can also be fiscally conservative. That is a lesson I will take with me when I return to Ottawa.

Similar to separating our waste into recyclable and trash, part of our job as Parliamentarians is to separate which policies are useful and which ones should be thrown out. What policies will actually protect our environment vs. those that are enacted to promote a particular political agenda.

Canada’s Conservatives have a long track record of practical, common-sense policies when it comes to environmental protection, and we will continue to fight for environmental policies that make sense for Canadians.