Dear Editor It’s mind-boggling that a government would create a 17-member panel of experts to advise it on an important issue like climate change, sit on its report for almost a year, and then summarily consign it to the scrap heap because it supposedly didn’t provide a balance between “environmental responsibility and economic opportunity.”
What an absolute farce. The only reason the B.C. Liberals substituted their own (and rather lame) climate plan was not to strike any balance but, rather, to give a leg up to LNG proponents.
The key proposal of the Climate Leadership Team report was to unfreeze the carbon tax and, starting in 2018, increase it by $10 a ton annually.
Only one team member dissented: the representative of the B.C. LNG Alliance, a lobby group. No surprise there. But, in kowtowing to that view, Christy Clark & Co. are essentially declaring they intend to facilitate the development of a LNG industry at any cost.
Unfortunately, a good part of the cost involves the public.
First of all, adhering to the principle of a revenue-neutral tax, the climate team proposed that a major share of the expected increase in carbon tax revenue be used to lower the PST from seven per cent to six per cent.
Secondly, it recommended the added revenue also be used “to adjust the current low income and rural and northern tax credits to ensure the most vulnerable individuals and families are not adversely impacted.” The implementation of both would have been welcomed by all and sundry.
But, of course, the B.C. Liberal government does not recognize the public interest as a priority, environmentally or economically.
If that was not clear before, there should be no doubt about it now.
Bill Brassington Sr., Burnaby
