EDITORIAL: Feds say their climate law is unenforceable

Law was the centrepiece of former prime minister Justin Trudeau’s failed $200-billion-plus climate strategy

Published Sep 01, 2026  •  Last updated 15 minutes ago  •  2 minute read

Smoke pours from the Lyondell Basell Houston oil refinery in Houston, Texas, June 14, 2024. Photo by Brandon Bell /Getty Images

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In the category of truth being stranger than fiction, the Mark Carney government is arguing in court that the signature piece of Justin Trudeau’s climate action plan — the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act — is unenforceable.

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Also, that it’s not the job of the courts to rule on federal climate policy.

That may come as a shock to Canadians who remember the Trudeau government crowing when the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2021 by a 6-3 margin that Trudeau’s carbon pricing law was constitutional, after it was challenged by Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan as an intrusion into provincial authority.

But that was then, and this is now.

Now, as first reported by the CBC, a group of environmental activists are asking the federal court to compel the government to update its 2030 emission targets, which are no longer realistic, or declare the current plan is a violation of the act, intended to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

The federal government argues its net zero law, which says it is binding on the government and was the centrepiece of Trudeau’s failed $200-billion-plus climate strategy — only says the government may decide to amend its emission targets, but does not require it.

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Nor does it contain any penalties for failing to meet its targets.

Rather, the purpose of the legislation was to establish a pathway to achieving net zero emissions by 2050, by which the government’s success or failure could be judged.

Carney and his government have already admitted they will not hit their 2030 and 2035 emission reduction targets under the net zero legislation, although they remain committed to reaching net zero by 2050.

The government estimates it will only achieve about half of the 2030 target of reducing emissions to at least 40% below 2005 levels.

The latest government data says it is only one quarter of the way to the target.

Carney has said Trudeau’s plan contained too much regulation and not enough action to be effective.

But environmentalists argue Carney’s decisions to cancel the consumer carbon tax, EV mandates and oil and gas emission caps, while loosening clean electricity and methane regulations and supporting a new oil pipeline from Alberta to B.C. contributed to making the 2030 and 2035 targets unachievable.

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