Beyond The Commons

 Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

Make the polluter pay

by Aaron Wherry on Friday, December 9, 2011 11:36am - 13 Comments

Thomas Mulcair tables a cap-and-trade proposal.

Mulcair’s plan goes further than the cap and trade proposal advanced by late NDP leader Jack Layton in the party’s election platform last spring. It would apply the “polluter-pay” principle not just to the 700 largest industrial emitters but to all major sources of greenhouse gases. Mulcair says Canada “can no longer afford to focus only on the worst of the worst.”

The plan and Mulcair’s candidacy have been endorsed by Weaver, lead author of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and co-recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. ”Canada needs a prime minister who recognizes that a healthy economy does not have to come at the expense of a healthy environment,” Weaver said in a written statement Thursday. ”In my considered assessment, Thomas Mulcair is ideally suited for the task.”

The backgrounder distributed by the Mulcair campaign yesterday is here.

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  • Anonymous
  • Anonymous

    More “preaching to the choir”  – yawn.

    • Anonymous

      He’s trying to get the job as head of the choir. Who the hell did you expect him to be preaching to? 

    • OriginalEmily1

      I think ‘make the polluter pay’ is a statement most Canadians agree with.

      • Anonymous

        The consumer always pays,  i.e. B.C. carbon tax on gas.

        • OriginalEmily1

          The polluter pays to clean up the mess…and they should never be allowed to pass that cost on to the consumer.

          Think of it as ‘the cost of doing business’

          In the case of gas specifically…the consumer IS a polluter. One of many along the line, but also a polluter.

        • Anonymous

          Given that the only other alternative is the taxpayer.. that’s a good thing, isn’t it?

          • Anonymous

            Then why not a carbon tax on polyester panties, nylon hose???

          • Anonymous

            I think there probably should be. Probably the easiest way is to have the resource extractor pay it, and then pass those costs on down.

        • Anonymous

          Better than shifting it to the non-consumer, which is what we do when we use municipal property taxes to pay for roads, bridges etc.

  • Anonymous

    Funny, a guy that makes his living off of pushing junk climate science supports a guy who wants to pour billions of dollars into the idiotic war on carbon dioxide.
     
    I wonder how much of the government grant money he’s received has gone into NDP pockets?
     

    • wilson

      McGuinty’s roadmap to his green diaster came from the Pembina Inst,
      which is funded by Tides Canada (which is a funnel for cash donations from US Billionairs)

  • wilson

    ‘…It would apply the “polluter-pay” principle not just to the 700 largest industrial emitters but to all major sources of greenhouse gases….’

    Wow, another job killing ‘tax on everything’…..but only in Canada, eh
    That would kill what’s left of our manufacturing industries in Ontario and Quebec, they won’t be able to compete with exports, if China & USA aren’t taxing everything too.

    Forced to live with McGuinty’s green disaster, Ontarians may be just a wee bit turned off to more green costs.  And that is where Dippers need to grow. 

    And here in Alberta our industry already pumps literally billions into oil and gas enviro research and a carbon tax, yup in 2007 industry got a carbon tax scheme of their own,
     so the ‘carrot’ part of Mulcairs scheme could go into the Heritage Fund.
    Ontario would get the ‘stick’ part. 

      

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