SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Yellowknifers were caught in the middle of a protest that erupted in the House of Commons on Monday.

Dawn Tremblay, a Yellowknife environmentalist, was part of a group of Northerners who packed the gallery when a demonstration – dubbed a "flash mob" – interrupted the Parliament's question period.

Ecology North's Daniel T'Seleie, at podium, addresses climate change with the group Powershift in Ottawa. - photo courtesy of Dawn Tremblay

She, and a number of young Northerners from the NWT and Nunavut, travelled to Ottawa joining nearly 1,000 other young Canadians in the Power Shift 2009 Canada conference – a global movement demanding immediate action on climate change from government.

Speaker Peter Milliken was forced to halt question period when Tremblay said protesters began chanting "I say climate, you say justice, climate, justice," "I say indigenous you say right, indigenous, right" and "Pass Bill C-311, pass it."

The raucous spilled over into the Hall of Honour when security cleared the gallery after the nearly 120 protesters refused to be pacified. A few of the more rowdy dissidents were detained by RCMP, but no charges were laid.

Demonstrators were showing their support for a NDP proposed bill – the Climate Change Accountability Act – calling for an 80 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2050. The bill, which passed second reading back in April, was voted back to committee last week. The NDP and members of Power Shift were hopeful Bill C-311 would have been adopted in time for next month's UN conference on climate change in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Tremblay said the protest, "lasted a good few minutes and everyone followed suit. It is important to say that it was non-partisan; it was not linked to any party; it was not planned; it was not organized."

Tremblay was seated with other Northerners including Ecology North's Daniel T'Seleie, who will be attending the international climate change conference. Other Northerners included Hay River's Pam Gross, Fort Providence's Kari Hergott, and Sandi Vincent of Iqaluit.

The group was in Ottawa to attend Power Shift's national youth leaders' Summit said Tremblay.

"On Monday, we had an official press release and we were supported by five MPs from three different parties to show it was a non-partisan issue. It went over very well. We read our declaration and when we finished all the MPs stood up and supported it after we spoke." she said.

"In the first 15 minutes (of question period) a Nunavik MP (Yvon Levesque) from the Bloq stood up and mentioned the North and climate change and he recognized that the youth had met and were concerned about climate justice," said Tremblay, adding the protest broke out following that statement. "The youth are very frustrated about that because they don't want to see Canada be uncooperative internationally. We are not only going (to Copenhagen) with a very uncooperative mandate we are actually hindering co-operation, "she said of Canada's international stance on climate change.

T'seleie wrote a letter to Northern News Services supporting that stance, stating, "When nations of the world meet to negotiate a follow-up to the Kyoto Protocol this December at the UN Climate Change Summit in Denmark, Canada needs to be a co-operative and productive partner, not an obstacle to a fair and binding agreement as we have been in years past."

After the protest, Conservative Party members stood up calling the actions of the protesters a NDP stunt.

Power Shift began in 2007 as an initiative of the United States' Energy Action Coalition.