Platform 2024

Working Together for Solutions

From Crises to Sustainable Futures

These crises require working together with individuals, communities, organizations, and political parties for social, economic, environmental, and political decision-making that values the knowledge and priorities of all Nova Scotians. We want to join others in contributing to solutions based on sustainable, collaborative decisions rather than divisive political strategies that alienate voters through broken promises.

This vision for working together will prioritize equitable citizen participation in government and a government held accountable to all citizens. We will collaborate for quality of life that comes from thriving communities with access for all to affordable safe housing, healthy food, and basics of life. We will join with others who want healthcare that ensures staffing, services, and resources to support everyone’s physical, emotional, and social wellbeing, and lifelong education that commits to all students realizing their goals and contributing to a sustainable future for themselves and others. We will rally for clean air, clean water, healthy soil, productive agricultural land, and a green economy that includes a just transition and training for workers. We will share the responsibility for ecological protection and stewardship of our forests, oceans, rivers, lakes, wetlands, coastlines, and diverse species, and survival of the planet.

Responsible Government

          We, the Green Party of Nova Scotia, acknowledge that we are operating and living on the unceded land of the Mi’kmaq and that we have a responsibility as settlers and signatories of the Peace and Friendship Treaties to actively work toward Truth and Reconciliation to create a society where we learn from their wisdom as stewards of the land and are truly living in peace and friendship with the Mi’kmaq.

          The crisis in Responsible Government is a growing distrust of public institutions, due to a persistent failure of public leaders to gain the public’s trust. Political decision-making happens mainly among insiders of the governing political party without open, inclusive consultation for public wellbeing and future sustainability, leading to present crises.

          In an era of disinformation on social media, governments are falling to cults of personality that prey on distrust, and real problems are ignored in favour of unfounded conspiracy theories. When institutions fail us, people suffer, particularly in marginalized communities that are increasingly scapegoated, including racialized individuals (Mi’kmaq, African Nova Scotians), language minorities (e.g. French Acadians), women, youth, immigrants, people living with disabilities, and especially the 2SLGBTQQIA+ community. Responsible government requires working together to see past disinformation and division to govern equitably and justly for all Canadians. We must collaborate across the political aisle and find real solutions to real problems.

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Restoring Trust in Government

          Green MLAs do politics differently. The Nova Scotia Legislature can be a place for collaboration, openness and transparency, with a fair and proportional voting system. With the public good as our goal, we support governance where equitable participation is paramount. Recognizing that decisions must serve all of society and the ecological processes on which society depends, we prioritize the engagement of all demographics, including youth, in the political process. We believe in the right of all Nova Scotians to have a truly representative government, and will not rest until our democratic institutions are reformed to better reflect the will of voters.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Establish a non-partisan Citizen’s Assembly to choose a voting system that is fair, proportional, democratic, and suited to Nova Scotia’s unique history and geography, to immediately replace our outdated and disproportionate first-past-the-post voting system.
  • Reform campaign finance rules to reduce the influence of money in politics by decreasing individual donation limits and rebates to help level the uneven playing field created by wealth disparity.
  • Allocate public funds toward more widely accessible mechanisms such as increased per-vote subsidy or a democracy voucher program.
  • Make public funding and other tools equally available to both political parties and independent candidates.
  • Assist municipalities to engage in their own democratic reforms to reflect the unique character and needs of each local democracy.
  • Amend the Municipal Elections Act and amend or enact other enabling legislation as required to allow municipalities to reform their voting systems, and to provide institutional support for the implementation of any reform.
  • Explore options for municipalities to extend voting rights to permanent residents.
  • Reform municipal campaign finance rules by extending more stringent provincial rules to municipal campaigns where appropriate to improve the fairness of municipal elections.
  • Enforce fair hiring of public servants and fair and arms-length, transparent processes for making appointments to provincial agencies, boards, and commissions as well as the empowerment of all to serve as nonpartisan professionals.
  • Modernize work arrangements for public servants, including allowing greater managerial discretion around remote work and other flexible working arrangements, to bring provincial offices in line with comparable industry norms. These arrangements ensure competitive hiring and retention, greater long-term worker engagement and loyalty, and reductions in rush-hour traffic and pollution.
  • Support measures to provide life-long education and greater awareness of electoral and legislative processes, including public awareness campaigns administered by a non-partisan body such as Elections Nova Scotia.
  • Take measures to increase the engagement of all demographics in the political process such as lowering the voting age to 16 and hosting polling locations in high schools. These measures help to establish lifelong patterns of democratic participation for young voters.
  • Commit the government of Nova Scotia to the principles of open data by joining the International Open Data Charter of the Open Government Partnership, to promote transparency, accountability and ethical conduct.
  • Support the use of comprehensive fiscal measures, in particular carbon pricing with full rebates, to facilitate a fair and equitable transition to a green economy free of fossil fuels, with minimal economic impact and full transparency. Timetables for the implementation of such measures should be clear and specific to provide predictability and stability.

Decolonization, Reconciliation, and Stewardship

–          Green MLAs will honor our responsibility to work with the Mi’kmaq to build a future for Mi’kma’ki/Nova Scotia that honors treaty rights and actions for reconciliation guided by direct consultation with Mi’kmaw communities.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Support legal rights of the Mi’kmaq to the use, protection, and stewardship of land vital to their cultures, health, and wellbeing.

  • Follow the leadership of Mi’kmaw communities and implement a Two-Eyed Seeing approach to natural resource management that incorporates Western Scientific Knowledge and Indigenous Traditional Ecological Knowledge.

  • Support existing contributions and on-going consultations with elders, communities, and other Mi’kmaw spokespersons to build awareness about the history, culture, and wisdom of Indigenous peoples in Mi’kma’ki.

  • Support government investment in preservation and revitalization of the Mi’kmaw language. Support collaboration with the federal government to implement the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the Missing and Murdered Women, Girls, and Two-Spirit Peoples report, and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Support and acknowledge the right of Mi’kmaq people to have decision-making authority over the use of land and resources covered by the Peace and Friendship treaties.

  • Support and acknowledge the co-management of all Crown and other publicly managed land, where no decision on the use or disposition of said land is made, without prior informed consent of Mi’kmaq people.

  • Support collaborating with Mi’kmaq leaders to create a Land Back program to return the management and stewardship of all Crown lands to Mi’kmaq communities.

Policing and Criminal Justice

–          Responsible governmental solutions require a commitment to nonviolence. Peace and security for our communities should be based in cooperation, sound economic and social development, environmental safety, and respect for human rights, not threats of force or punishment. Overreliance on police services to deal with issues of mental health, poverty, and civil engagement are detrimental to the wellbeing of Nova Scotian society, and often unfairly targets people who are Black, Indigenous, or other people of colour, 2SLGBTQQIA+ peoples, or people living in poverty.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Support evidence-informed alternatives to reduce rates of recidivism/support individual rehabilitation.

  • Unburden police service resources by ensuring the use of appropriate responders, such as reallocating responsibility for wellness checks from police to crisis mental health services.

  • Reallocate funding from policing to community safety supports such as community mental health services, housing services, and others that are needed, and also work with affected communities.

  • Use alternative dispute resolution mechanisms that are culturally appropriate.

  • Support public education to strengthen understanding around consent to reduce instances of sexual abuse and to end prejudice and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Cost of Living and Housing

          Life has become too expensive for too many Nova Scotians, and our communities are suffering. People are cold, hungry, and sleeping rough at levels never before seen in the province. Desperation and poverty tears families apart, erodes the foundations of civil society, and exacerbates hyper-partisanship through the fierce disagreements that we’re seeing inside and outside our Legislature.

          The housing crisis in Nova Scotia has reached an alarming scale. The decades-long experiment with market-based housing strategy has been a failure, and the need for non-market housing is undeniable. We cannot continue down the same road that led us to this policy-driven housing crisis.

          At a time of acute crisis, partisan games will only leave Nova Scotians more destitute and disenfranchised. It is the responsibility of every MLA, regardless of party, to work toward real solutions for our province so all residents have the opportunity to live full lives. This will require looking for innovative ways to tackle issues like poverty, food insecurity, and housing while building sustainable industries with secure jobs and cleaner, more efficient and cost-effective ways to move people and goods around the province.

          Green MLAs will overcome partisan barriers and work with others to reduce and eliminate poverty throughout the province, as well as to implement policies which will provide a basic standard of living to all Nova Scotians in a prosperous, sustainable economy. Solutions will focus on the cost of living, poverty elimination, food security, housing, supports for homelessness, and job security, alongside the transition to a Green economy.

 

Poverty Elimination

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income plan for Nova Scotia, which is universal, unconditional, complementary to other programs, provides for basic needs, and respects human dignity.
  • Ensure that measures of liveable income account for food, clothing, shelter, and other resources that facilitate social engagement, such as access to travel and means of communication.
  • Reduce the number of hours before workers are guaranteed overtime pay from 48 to 42 hours.
  • Require that all owed vacation time and overtime be paid out when an employee quits, is laid off, or is terminated.

Food Security

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Increase investment and research into climate-friendly and regenerative agricultural practices and biopesticides.
  • Fund initiatives, such as community gardens, to foster agriculture in urban areas to produce more local food.
  • Create incentives for farmers to implement regenerative agricultural practices, recognizing benefits of agriculture in the carbon economy.
  • Empower farmers by collaborating with them to improve their capacity to sell their products in local retail markets.

Housing and Support for Homelessness

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Ensure Nova Scotians have the right to housing that meets their basic needs.
  • Increase investment in public housing and other forms of non-market housing.
  • Support non-market housing for low-income Nova Scotians and those at risk of homelessness.
  • Support price competition from the private sector, restoring a robust and competitive housing market like the one that existed before governments abandoned investment in public housing.
  • Implement a Housing First program with additional services for mental health, addictions, and employment assistance to address homelessness.
  • Lower the rent cap to 3%, reflecting the Bank of Canada target range for inflation, and apply it universally, including to new leases for the same unit.
  • Implement a truly actionable ban on rental discrimination against families with children.
  • Outlaw the use of software or services that rely on large databases to recommend rent prices to landlords. This ban will safeguard renters from algorithm-based forms of pricing collusion that can drive up rents.
  • Push for the establishment of a provincial Residential Tenancies Compliance Unit and establish a requirement for residential rental properties to be registered through the province or local municipality before being rented, and tighten requirements for “just cause” around evictions with a firm ban on renovictions.
  • Increase the Capped Assessment Program rate to 3% plus Consumer Price Index, recognizing the current inequity for first-time home buyers.

Transition to a Green Economy

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Transition away from fossil fuels as more sustainable technologies develop.
  • Support legislation and incentives to increase energy efficiency in all buildings in the province and to develop and implement green tech.
  • Support the public sector and training programs to help anyone who loses their job, or may lose their job, due to the transition to a green economy.
  • Enact Right to Repair legislation that enshrines the rights of individuals to repair or modify products that they own, saving costs and reducing needless waste.
  • Increase funding to the Clean Economy Grant Program, create both Masters and Doctoral awards with four grants at both levels, and increase funding to living wage levels; also make the grants renewable for one year for Masters students and two years for PhD students.
  • Develop and implement paid training programs for employees of sectors impacted by Artificial Intelligence (AI) or the transition to a green economy to facilitate transition into new fields.

Transportation

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Initiate a long-term project for a comprehensive, multimodal transit system designed for inter-municipal travel in Nova Scotia, including buses, light rail, and ferries, and integrate this system with existing municipal transit and active transportation infrastructure.
  • Collaborate with municipalities to implement or enhance mass transit systems and ensure they are integrated as much as possible with other transit options.
  • Drastically increase the allocation of provincial funds for transit infrastructure, matching each dollar spent on new highway construction with a dollar spent on building transit capacity.
  • Create tax incentives to build and operate public electric vehicle charging infrastructure, especially in rural areas.

Public Health and Wellbeing

          Nova Scotia’s healthcare system is in crisis, with patients facing long wait times, a shortage of professionals, and increasing privatization. There has been a failure to value the fundamental right to comprehensive, publicly delivered and accessible health services that Nova Scotians once relied on. Erosion has resulted from insufficient funding, inadequate planning for training of professionals and for failures to address the determinants of health, poverty being foremost among them. Nova Scotians need services beyond just physicians and hospitals. They deserve a prevention-first approach which values the physical, emotional, psychological, social, and spiritual aspects of wellbeing.

          We will work to stop further privatization of healthcare and gradually reverse our reliance on private healthcare providers. Resisting privatization will result in public services that are more personal, of better quality, with sufficient staffing, and overall less costly than private services. We will collaborate with communities, healthcare advocates, unions, universities, and other governments to ensure that we have sustainable staffing and planning for prevention and management of pandemics, health crises and climate-related events affecting health and wellbeing.

          The health and wellbeing of Nova Scotians is deeply connected to the health of our environment and communities. True health includes a livable income, nutritious food, clean air and water, safe homes, strong communities, and protection from climate disasters.

          We will support collaborative clinics and team-based family practices in communities. These will be staffed by diverse types of healthcare professionals tailored to meet community needs and will be affiliated with not-for-profit community organizations and health-related professionals who have a focus on prevention and wellbeing, such as health and physical educators. Services will be focused on inclusive access including provision to those most marginalized such as Black, Indigenous, People of Colour (BIPOC), seniors, and those with ability challenges, vulnerable mental health, or needing gender-affirming care.

          We will collaborate to move from the health and wellbeing crisis to a sustainable and effective model which works for all Nova Scotians.

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Comprehensive, Publicly Delivered and Accessible Services

–          Nova Scotia is now purchasing virtual health care from Maple, a privately operated service partially owned by Loblaw Companies Limited. This service is expensive, and profits companies and their shareholders at the expense of Nova Scotian taxpayers. Virtual healthcare is a useful component of accessible and affordable healthcare delivery but should be owned by Nova Scotians and delivered as an integrated part of our public healthcare system.

–          Most long-term care in Nova Scotia is privately operated by large corporations but paid for by Nova Scotian tax dollars. This prioritizes the profits of shareholders over human wellbeing. The COVID-19 pandemic showed us how profit-motivated low staffing levels, often shuffling minimal staff from one site to another, contributed to much higher rates of resident mortality and staff illness than in public and not-for-profit facilities.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Value healthcare workers by listening to their needs, and improving working conditions including salaries, benefits, retention bonuses, flexible hours, work-from-home options in a public virtual service where appropriate.

  • Focus efforts for increasing the number of healthcare workers on incentives for recruitment and retention, including through increased relief of student debt for medicine, dentistry, physiotherapy, and nursing for greater designated periods of service within the province.

  • Increase, in consultation with healthcare providers, the number of seats for both medical and nursing schools in Nova Scotia universities, as well as working to expand spaces in residency programs, and work towards developing better routes for those wishing to learn and practice medicine in French or Mi’kmaq.

  • Plan for future growth by further increasing medical and other healthcare professional education positions and upskilling opportunities, including language training, and subsidizing their costs.

  • Decreasing prolonged emergency room care by relieving a key blockage point – those waiting for long-term care (LTC) – by increasing the number of public or not-for-profit beds.

  • Decrease privatized services gradually as the increases in public services are sufficient, with the eventual complete phase-out of private medical clinics and services falling under the Canada Health Act.

  • Implement other options for decreasing costs and concerns to quality of care, such as through increased public delivery of services like paramedicine and increased oversight of services like LTC, including ensuring standard 4.1 hours per resident.

  • Renegotiate federal Canada Health Transfer payments to ensure adequate funding to eliminate privatization, increase training, better prepare for health crises, and expand programs.

Improving the Public System

–          Greens understand that collaboration with communities, healthcare advocates, unions and various government departments is necessary to ensure that we have sustainable staffing, are meeting the needs for service delivery and planning for the future.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Support collaborative clinics and team-based family practices in communities.

  • Hire and train provincial health navigators to direct patients to appropriate health services, especially mental health services.

  • Work toward including dental care, pharmacare, and assistive communication supports such as hearing aids in provincial health insurance.

  • Call for a review of cybersecurity around patient data in the province to avoid breaches and protect the privacy of patients.

  • Review licensing requirements for externally-trained healthcare providers, inviting representatives from the appropriate agencies and unions, to make the process easier for them to register in Nova Scotia while still upholding a proper standard of care.

  • Staff clinics with diverse healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurse practitioners, nurses, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, physician assistants, midwives, social workers, dietitians, pharmacists, and community paramedics, tailored to meet community needs.

  • Fund clinics to allow them to provide additional services such as laboratory testing and routine care, and to remain open on weekends.

  • Improve access to mental health services for all Nova Scotians, especially those without a family doctor.

  • Affiliate clinics with not-for-profit community organizations and professionals who have a focus on prevention and wellbeing such as health and physical educators.

  • Establish women’s health centres to address women’s unique healthcare needs and reduce barriers to abortion and reproductive health services.

  • Provide universal access to midwifery services.

  • Train for dedicated roles to enhance transgender and gender-affirming healthcare.

  • Support teachers and guidance counselors in identifying and addressing mental health and behavioural concerns in schools.

  • Improve addiction and mental health services and ensure that all private services have adequate oversight and that there will be ongoing follow-up.

  • Ensure that those struggling with chronic conditions such as MS, arthritis, dementia and long-COVID receive specialized care with ongoing follow-up.

  • Advocate for key dementia care priorities including: help break down stigma; improve the diagnosis experience; encourage Dementia Friendly Community developments, and increase investments across the care continuum for people living with dementia and their care partners.

Increasing Prevention

–          The Green Party of Nova Scotia asserts that our healthcare system can provide services which are sustainably affordable and sufficient if we pay close attention to the determinants of health: income and social status, employment and working conditions, education and literacy, childhood experiences, physical environments, social supports and coping skills, healthy behaviours, access to health services, gender, culture and race/racism. The key determinant of health is poverty. Healthy families require nutritious food, healthy environments and supports to live productive, fulfilling lives. Current income assistance programs in Nova Scotia fail to prevent poverty or stem the trend of increasing poverty in Nova Scotia.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Work with other Maritime provinces to eliminate daylight saving time, reducing poor health outcomes associated with twice-yearly time changes.

  • Adopt measurement(s) of wellbeing such as the Genuine Progress Indicator, rather than just purely economic measures like GDP.

  • Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income.

  • Protect students, long-term care residents and patients at hospitals by creating an Indoor Air Quality Act.

  • Support seniors to continue active, healthy lives in their own homes or in quality, community-based assisted living if needed.

  • Support marginalized communities with access to air-conditioning, affordable healthy food and environments free of toxic pollutants.

  • Electrify school bus fleets to reduce exposure of school-age children to automobile emissions, following similar Green-led efforts in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.

  • Promote healthy life-styles and exercise with early interventional approaches to mental and physical health.

Inclusive Education

          The Green Party of Nova Scotia urges consulting and working with school-based staff, school community members, and union representatives to address the crisis in public education. Many Nova Scotians have concerns about unsafe school and classroom conditions and incidents, insufficient levels of staffing and resources for all learners, and governmental disregard for responding to local needs. This crisis has worsened due to inadequate funding, struggles of families and individuals for basic necessities, and lack of governmental consultation and informed decision-making.

          A quality public education system needs to prioritize safety, justice, and purposeful learning, leading to the social and environmental change crucial to wellbeing.

          Greens believe that education should ensure equitable access to programs and resources for lifelong learning throughout early childhood, elementary and secondary, postsecondary, and beyond in adulthood. Inclusive education means supporting opportunities for all learners to realize their unique potential to develop into citizens who will contribute the skills, expertise, and knowledge that will sustain our communities and our province.

          Consultation and collaboration begins with our treaty obligations on shared Mi’kmaw territory. Our educational policies and practices must recognize and honour Indigenous ecological knowledge and agreements for sharing as expressed in Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action. We express our gratitude to the Mi’kmaq for sharing their understanding of msit no’kmaq, the interconnectedness of all things, and strive to emphasize this concept through inclusive learning, integrated curriculum, and safe, respectful, healthy, and sustainable indoor and outdoor learning environments.

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Support the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action for education in consultation with survivors, Indigenous peoples, and educators by:

  • Developing age-appropriate curriculum for grade primary to grade 12 students on residential “schools,” Treaties, and Indigenous people’s historical and contemporary contributions to Canada,
  • Providing the necessary funding to postsecondary institutions to educate teachers on how to integrate Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods into classrooms,
  • Providing the necessary funding to First Nations schools to utilize Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods in classrooms,
  • Providing an education on comparative religious studies, including a segment on Indigenous spiritual beliefs and practices developed in collaboration with Elders.

  • Aim to rebuild our educational system by participating in community-based consultative processes for decision-making that include Mi’kmaq, African Nova Scotian communities, Acadian, 2SLGBTQQIA+, disabled, and newcomer communities, early childhood educators, teachers, school staff, and representative unions, parents, students, and community members.
  • Introduce targeted training and programmes related to respect for diversity, anti-oppression, and anti-racism.
  • Invest in licensed child care expansion in the not-for-profit and public sector to build a publicly-managed and publicly-delivered system.
  • Support initiatives that address the Nova Scotia Teachers’ Union’s demands for dealing with and preventing school violence, including provision for adequate human resources, clear consequences for incidents of violence, clear reporting requirements and safe and secure responses related to lock-down and evacuation, and province-wide training dedicated to school safety.
  • Accelerate recruitment of Student Support Workers by improving working conditions and ensuring that they receive fair, competitive compensation that recognizes the passion and dedication demanded of their roles.
  • Develop a whole school approach that introduces environmental studies and climate action as an integrated and cross-curricular subject at all grade levels, from primary to 12, in partnership with Mi'kmaw communities and in consultation with school-based and community groups.
  • Provide guidance and supports for current and future school/ community gardens in all schools, or alternatively communities, in the province to promote food security, environmental sustainability, lifelong healthy food choices, social inclusion, life skills, the arts, and all subject areas, through integrated curricular action plans and inquiry and project-based learning on a classroom as well as a school-wide basis.
  • Initiate an environmental assessment and plan for the environmentally sustainable greening of schoolyards as outdoor spaces for integrated environmental action, project-based learning and safe learning spaces in all subject areas.
  • Support opportunities for learners to develop skills in critical thinking, communication, collaboration, creative problem-solving, and citizenship.
  • Expand school-based arts programmes including visual, musical, performing, and dramatic arts.
  • Provide provincially-approved education resources for homeschoolers, and children and youth in care.
  • Provide targeted strategies for specific areas in education such as rural education, French language instruction, and students living in poverty or in care.
  • Provide appropriate resources to the Conseil Scolaire Acadien Provincial (CSAP) including for the promotion of the French language outside the classrooms in youth leadership activities and community development activities.
  • Provide coherent support for emerging immigrant and refugee communities for students, parents, and teachers.
  • Initiate a workforce planning strategy to recruit and train teachers who work in marginalized and underserved communities.
  • Address factors such as housing affordability, career prospects, and lower-than-average wage growth to support transitions to green jobs in Nova Scotia in sectors such as construction, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, and forestry.
  • Support retraining incentives, programmes and courses in postsecondary institutions to provide a just transition to climate change employment.
  • Restore trades and other skills-based curricula in intermediate and high schools, and expand paid apprenticeships and co-op placement programmes incorporating green skills and knowledge.
  • Increase access to adult learning and lifelong education through providing staff and resources to address learning goals and needs related to literacy, numeracy, upgrading, computer literacy, skills training, and English as an Additional Language learning, among others.
  • Eliminate tuition fees at Nova Scotia Community College for Nova Scotia residents and work towards free tuition for all resident domestic students at all postsecondary institutions in Nova Scotia.
  • Provide free postsecondary education to youth who were formerly in care.

Climate and Environment

          In 2022, Nova Scotia was left decimated by the force of Hurricane Fiona, one of the worst and costliest natural disasters to hit the province since Hurricane Juan in 2003. In 2023, the province was hit with its worst wildfires on record as well as torrential rainfall resulting in mass floods. And, in 2024, it was hit with an unprecedented amount of snow which saw much of the province buried, and yet another flood. What was clear in all of these events was how ill-prepared the province is for the climate crisis in which we find ourselves.

          Nova Scotia hangs off the end of continental Canada via the Isthmus of Chignecto, a floodplain, and our thousands of kilometers of coastline sit exposed to the Atlantic Ocean. Even with advantages such as the coastal temperature buffer, we have seen a steady increase in summer temperatures, which puts many individuals, especially elderly individuals, at risk of complications from heat stroke. In addition, increased storm surges put our coastlines at increased risk of erosion, potentially endangering people living on or near them. If we plan to continue relying on our forests, our coastlines, and our freshwater systems as parts of our economy and as sources of food, we need to ensure they are not depleted or destroyed.

          While Nova Scotia cannot unilaterally stop carbon emissions, we can be a leader in proper mitigation and planning. As the only party taking the climate crisis seriously, the Green Party will work collaboratively in the legislature to ensure Nova Scotia is prepared for the future.

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Mitigating Emissions

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Further the implementation of non-emitting modes of transportation within urban centres such as bike lanes, bike sharing systems, and multi-use pathways.

  • Ensure provincial legislation is in place to protect old-growth forests and to both protect and remediate coastal salt marshes, which act as natural carbon sinks.

Energy

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Form a committee composed of members of academia, industry, and municipal representatives to develop a plan for modernizing Nova Scotia’s electrical infrastructure for efficiency and resilience to extreme weather event.

  • Support the development of offshore wind resources.

  • Continue to support initiatives to install solar panels on commercial and residential buildings, including in Mi’kmaq communities.

  • Implement a made-in-Nova Scotia carbon pricing system to replace the federal backstop system, removing loopholes for large emitters to ensure fairness and provide larger rebates for individuals .

  • Overhaul electricity regulations and regulatory processes to facilitate quicker adoption of innovative demand response programs and other smart grid technologies that are customer optional (“opt-in”). This modernization will keep electricity prices lower for customers while accelerating efforts to green the grid.

  • Provide increased incentives and financing options for purchasers of residential battery energy storage systems who participate in demand response programs. This measure will both increase the resiliency of the grid and encourage household-level climate adaptation against outages due to extreme weather events.

  • Explore steps to separate Nova Scotia Power’s generating assets into a subsidiary or other distinct entity from its transmission and distribution assets, while making provisions for grid balancing, to reduce the potential for conflicts of interest in negotiating Power Purchase Agreements and managing Generation Interconnection Procedures. This would open up the power generation market to greater competition.

  • Work toward achieving provincial carbon neutrality by 2050.

Forestry

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Fully implement the recommendations of the 2018 Lahey forestry report.

  • Collaborate with researchers and the forestry industry to develop more sustainable forestry practices.

  • Support measures to ensure the legislated elimination of clearcutting forestry practices.

  • Support facilitation of best practices silviculture on public and private land forestry and for old-forest restoration.

  • Call for full implementation of the Endangered Species Act on public and private land.

  • Urge legislation preventing toxic agents, such as glyphosate, from being applied to fields and forests.

  • Urge legislation preventing the use of forest biomass for the purpose of electricity generation both domestically and abroad.

  • Support measures that contribute to carbon sequestration and climate resilience, such as fire-risk criteria and incentives, to conserve old-growth and Acadian forests on public and private land.

  • Require both survey-based and molecular-based assessments of forest health and monitoring of invasive or destructive species.

Wetlands, Fisheries/Aquaculture, and Coastal Protection

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Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:

  • Reinstate the Coastal Protection Act, providing for coordinated and consistent province-wide safeguarding of coastlines.

  • Work closely with coastal ecologists to restore important buffering coastal habitats, such as salt marshes, across the province.

  • Ensure proper and cost-effective surveys of fish populations are consistently performed to monitor stock health and prevent overfishing.

  • Ban open-pen fish farms in favour of contained operations which do not endanger local fish populations.

  • Work with academics, fishers, and anglers to mitigate the introduction and spread of Aquatic Invasive Species, which may harm inland fishing operations.

  • Support the development and sustainable implementation of local aquaculture operations for various species.

  • Establish a council of licenced commercial fishers, Indigenous fishers, and government representatives to handle fisheries disputes equitably and prevent escalations.

 

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