Speech

Good afternoon.

It’s always a pleasure to show this great city, this culture and even this hockey team to my colleagues from the south.

As chair of this session of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, I’d like to thank everyone for their participation over the past two days.

Given the scope and diversity of the North American continent and our shared environment, gatherings such as this are invaluable: they sharpen the focus on our shared challenges and highlight the opportunities to join forces and address them – and I must say especially in Montreal, a true example of a forward looking city leading the way in greening the economy.

It has been a particular pleasure for me to work so closely with Administrator Jackson and Secretary Elvira, and to get a sense of just how closely our continental objectives are aligned.

Over the past two days, we’ve been able to make progress on some important issues. In particular, a highlight of this conference has been our launch of the North American Partnership for Environmental Community Action grant program.

It’s an initiative that will enable our citizens to directly be part of our shared efforts to address climate change, green our economy, and protect our ecosystems and communities. I’m confident this initiative will meet with great success as we move forward with it.

I’m pleased now to hand over the role of chair of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation to my colleague at the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

Administrator Jackson, let me assure you that you have the whole-hearted support of Canada and its government as we continue to ensure the Commission’s work remains accountable, relevant and responsive to North America’s people and environment. We will remain committed to building on the success of the Commission, as we all work together to improve our shared North American environment.

I also want to thank you all for coming.  And many thanks as well to all of the Secretariat staff and the officials of our three governments who worked so hard to pull together this event. It has been a productive and successful two days, and I’m very proud of the work we’ve accomplished here.

I now officially bringing the 18^th regular session of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation Council to a close.

Thank you all for your kind attention.

I look forward to next summer in New Orleans.

Thank you.