EMAIL CANADA'S SENATORS TODAY!: Stop this Budget and the attack on environmental law! (Please share!)

This week the Senate Finance Committee considers the Budget bill, with its damaging changes to environmental assessment legislation. Some Senators say they'll try to cut the attack out of the Budget. They need to hear your support. Please spend a minute to copy and send this email to the Senate!

Fourteen environmental groups have already written to all Senators to say the same thing - now a timely onslaught of citizen emails is needed!

I don't have the technical skills to make a super-duper web form for you to use. So please cut and paste all Senators' email addresses below straight into your email, and feel free to write your own email or use the text below. DON'T FORGET TO INCLUDE YOUR NAME AND YOUR COMMUNITY & PROVINCE!The email list includes all Senators, not just the ones who sit on the Finance committee. All of them will have to vote on it, maybe even this week!

Thanks for taking a few minutes to help!
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Sample email text:

Subject: Senator - please cut the attack on environmental law from the Budget!

Dear Senators,
I am concerned about the future of environmental assessment. We are writing to request that, as members Canada's Parliament reviewing Budget Bill C-9, the Jobs and Economic Growth Act, you stand firm to defend Parliamentary tradition by refusing to pass the Budget with as it stands, with non-budgetary measures buried inside it. The Bill was passed by the House of Commons merely in order to avoid an election, and in spite of the objections of all opposition parties representing a majority in that House. I ask that you show courage and use your unique position within our system to defend Parliament's and the public's right to a full, proper, and separate legislative consideration of the provisions aimed at weakening environmental assessment contained in the Bill. I ask that the Senate sever these - parts 19 and 20 - from the Budget.

The provisions in parts 19 and 20 are clearly aimed at gutting the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act ("CEAA"), which requires environmental assessments for development projects such as tar sands mines, oil and gas pipelines and nuclear power plants. These provisions have nothing whatsoever to do with the Budget, and have no business being there.

By burying these significant changes to environmental assessment deep within a towering, 900-page budget bill, the government has deliberately sought to bypass the will of Parliament, which set out a legal requirement for a comprehensive seven-year review of CEAA that is slated to begin by June 2010. Hiding these significant changes from the serious Parliamentary and public scrutiny they require is harmful to the principles of good and transparent government. Every Senator in Parliament should be prepared to stop this end-run around democratic process.

Canadians like me are counting on you, Senator, to do the job that you've been sent to Ottawa to do on our behalf --- to give ill-considered bills from the House of Commons serious and sober second thought. Now is your time to act to protect Canadians and the environment on which we all depend.

Sincerely,

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Email list to copy straight into your "TO:" line:
(Includes emails of PM, Finance minister, Environment minister, and relevant opposition leaders and critics)

plettd@sen.parl.gc.ca, poirir@sen.parl.gc.ca, poulim@sen.parl.gc.ca, poyv@sen.parl.gc.ca, rainen@sen.parl.gc.ca, ringup@sen.parl.gc.ca, rivarm@sen.parl.gc.ca, jcrivest@sen.parl.gc.ca, rompkw@sen.parl.gc.ca, runcib@sen.parl.gc.ca, kfl@sen.parl.gc.ca, seidmj@sen.parl.gc.ca, sibnic@sen.parl.gc.ca, smithd@sen.parl.gc.ca, stgerg@sen.parl.gc.ca, stewac@sen.parl.gc.ca, stollp@sen.parl.gc.ca, stratt@sen.parl.gc.ca, tardic@sen.parl.gc.ca, tkachd@sen.parl.gc.ca, wallaj@sen.parl.gc.ca, wallinp@sen.parl.gc.ca, wattc@sen.parl.gc.ca, zimmer@sen.parl.gc.ca, harbm@sen.parl.gc.ca, hervic@sen.parl.gc.ca, lacomd@sen.parl.gc.ca, hublee@sen.parl.gc.ca, jaffem@sen.parl.gc.ca, johnsj@sen.parl.gc.ca, joyals@sen.parl.gc.ca, kennyco@sen.parl.gc.ca, kinsen@sen.parl.gc.ca, kochhv@sen.parl.gc.ca, langd@sen.parl.gc.ca, charrf@sen.parl.gc.ca, lavigr@sen.parl.gc.ca, lebrem@sen.parl.gc.ca, losier@sen.parl.gc.ca, smithc@sen.parl.gc.ca, mahovf@sen.parl.gc.ca, mannif@sen.parl.gc.ca, marshe@sen.parl.gc.ca, dallar@sen.parl.gc.ca, dawsod@sen.parl.gc.ca, dayja@sen.parl.gc.ca, debanp@sen.parl.gc.ca, tessil@sen.parl.gc.ca, dininc@sen.parl.gc.ca, pdowne@sen.parl.gc.ca, mikeduffy@sen.parl.gc.ca, dyckli@sen.parl.gc.ca, eatonn@sen.parl.gc.ca, egglea@sen.parl.gc.ca, fairbj@sen.parl.gc.ca, finled@sen.parl.gc.ca, fortis@sen.parl.gc.ca, foxf@sen.parl.gc.ca, frasej@sen.parl.gc.ca, fruml@sen.parl.gc.ca, fruml@sen.parl.gc.ca, greens@sen.parl.gc.ca, martin@sen.parl.gc.ca, massip@sen.parl.gc.ca, mccoye@sen.parl.gc.ca, meighen@sen.parl.gc.ca, mercet@sen.parl.gc.ca, merchp@sen.parl.gc.ca, mitchg@sen.parl.gc.ca, mocklp@sen.parl.gc.ca, moorew@sen.parl.gc.ca, munsoj@sen.parl.gc.ca, murral@sen.parl.gc.ca, mcgeed@sen.parl.gc.ca, neufer@sen.parl.gc.ca, nolinp@sen.parl.gc.ca, ogilvk@sen.parl.gc.ca, olived@sen.parl.gc.ca, patted@sen.parl.gc.ca, pepinl@sen.parl.gc.ca, russem@sen.parl.gc.ca, lachah@sen.parl.gc.ca, robicf@sen.parl.gc.ca, andrer@sen.parl.gc.ca, anguswd@sen.parl.gc.ca, bakerg@sen.parl.gc.ca, gautht@sen.parl.gc.ca, boisvp@sen.parl.gc.ca, brazep@sen.parl.gc.ca, brownb@sen.parl.gc.ca, callbc@sen.parl.gc.ca, campbel@sen.parl.gc.ca, carigc@sen.parl.gc.ca, carsts@sen.parl.gc.ca, champa@sen.parl.gc.ca, chapum@sen.parl.gc.ca, cochre@sen.parl.gc.ca, comeag@sen.parl.gc.ca, coolsa@sen.parl.gc.ca, cordyj@sen.parl.gc.ca, cowanj@sen.parl.gc.ca, pm@pm.gc.ca, Flaherty.J@parl.gc.ca, Prentice.J@parl.gc.ca, Duceppe.G@parl.gc.ca, Bigras.B@parl.gc.ca, leader@greenparty.ca, Layton.J@parl.gc.ca, Duncan.L@parl.gc.ca, Ignatieff.M@parl.gc.ca, McGuinty.D@parl.gc.ca, McCallum.J@parl.gc.ca, Mulcair.T@parl.gc.ca, Paille.D@parl.gc.ca