Editor’s note: This letter is addressed to Dave Van Kesteren, MP.
Sir: I am writing in regards to the brochure which I received in the mail the other day regarding the subject of a federal carbon tax. I am concerned by the adversarial tone, the ambiguity and lack of sources for the scant information provided, the lack of an alternative plan more elaborate and helpful than ‘scrap everything’ and the ‘survey’ whose format appears to have been cribbed from a Chick cartoon.
This is to say that the brochure appears to be less about informing the population than distributing propaganda—a practice not commonly associated with legitimate democracy or responsible government.
I’d like to point out right away that it was the Conservative Party’s man, Doug Ford, who recently scrapped Ontario’s cap and trade program—an emissions trading system proven to be fair and effective in the European Union and elsewhere. This was done in a recklessly swift and unilateral manner, not so much as asking for public opinion.
I’m not sure about the carbon tax, but under cap and trade the supposed expense to consumers was entirely illegitimate. To begin with it did not apply to consumers. The threat of an associated price hike was a shirking of responsibility by carbon-centric corporations who passed the cost of purchasing extra carbon credits – inflated by as much as 500 per cent as a scare tactic and an excuse for gouging – on to their customers. Price hikes are not an unfortunate necessity in difficult times – they are corporate temper tantrums.
I’ve checked some figures regarding carbon emissions, and the numbers shocked me. According to information from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, converted to metric, this is how much CO2 we generate when we drive:
Gasoline: 2.34 kg/l
E10: 2.3 kg/l (2.1 kg from fossil fuel, 0.2 kg from ethanol)
Diesel: 2.67 kg/l
This means that a reasonably fuel-efficient vehicle will release one tonne of CO2 over the course of about 5,600 km travel. I figure that makes me personally responsible for a conservative as much as two tonnes of CO2 per year in terms of travel alone, and I don’t get out much.
Maybe there should be a tax on that. Maybe the revenue from that tax ought to be subsidizing alternative energy vehicles within everyone’s financial reach. Moving away from fossil fuel is kind of the entire point, after all.
It’s a way of acceptably distributing the cost of a necessary upgrade and easing our way into the future rather than suffering the shock of an energy revolution. In the end we would all benefit, with one notable exception: the oil industry which has gouged, lied to, cheated, restrained, polluted and corrupted our society for far too long already.
It seems to me that your party (and, in honesty, the Liberals as well) have an inverted notion of what needs to be protected and what needs to be regulated. We are stewards of this world – and we are also its wards. As this Earth suffers, we suffer. As it dies, we die.
There is nothing controversial in this. This is incontrovertible fact backed by decades of scientific observation. The “controversy” is nothing more than an appalling filibuster by politicians. This planet is falling apart under the weight of our oil dependency, and we’re kind of stuck here.
Instead of fighting a war against other parties in which it is the people who perennially lose, could you perhaps work with them to ensure the most broadly beneficial outcome? Your constituents need you to champion their needs, not those of an obsolete, destructive and sociopathic industry.
Michael Balls
Chatham
