Canada's Greenhouse Gas Emission Reductions Goals? They're a joke. Only New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are on track to meet them
I received
an email today, from the Auditor General of Manitoba, which summarizes activities it
undertook for 2017 - 2018. One of the
reports was titled, "Perspectives
on Climate Change Action in Canada". It's a lengthy report, but one
thing stood out as I was glancing through the report on the bottom of page 4,
top of page 5 ... it read:
Of the jurisdictions that had 2020
reduction target's, only 2 (New
Brunswick and Nova
Scotia) were on track to meet them with current
actions, based on domestic emission reductions. In addition, governments were
using different baselines years for their targets or were setting different types of targets, such as overall emission
reduction targets versus targets for specific sectors of the economy.
Furthermore, governments were using different approaches for reducing emissions and different sources for estimating annual emissions. As a result, it is unclear how the federal,
provincial, and territorial governments would measure, monitor, and report on
the individual contributions to meeting Canada's national 2030 target.
Many governments did
not have detailed implementation plans to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions. For the most part, auditors
found that governments' plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
consisted of high level goals, with little guidance on how to implement actions. Details often missing from the plans included
timelines, estimates of the reductions expected from individual action items,
and information about funding.
The highlighted, and italicized, portions of the above were
done by me. As you look at them, I feel
fairly confident you can see why. If
anyone wanted proof that Carbon Taxes being imposed by some provincial
governments -- and dictated with an or
else sledge hammer by the federal Trudeau government -- those highlighted portions
alone are proof they are little more than a tax grab.
Reason enough for Saskatchewan's provincial government to fight action by the federal Liberals from the start, and for them to now be joined by the Ontario provincial government of Conservative Premier Doug Ford
Speaking to the CBC last month Canada's Environment Minister Catherine
McKenna called Ontario bailing out of carbon market "sad". She went on to say, "It's lose-lose: on the environment, lose on
the economy ... our (Liberal) government is all in on climate action."
Reason enough for Saskatchewan's provincial government to fight action by the federal Liberals from the start, and for them to now be joined by the Ontario provincial government of Conservative Premier Doug Ford
Catherine McKenna, Minister
of Environment and Climate Change in the Justin Trudeau federal government |
What action? Canada's Greenhouse Gas Emission
Reductions Goals? They're a joke -- and
it's borne out by the Manitoba Auditor Generals reports.
Which is at least in part why I believe the premiers of Saskatchewan (Scott Moe) and Ontario
(Doug Ford), are similarly "All In"
on the fight against Canada's
Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna.
“We agreed today (July 19th) to join forces and use every single tool at
our disposal to challenge the federal government’s authority to arbitrarily
impose a carbon tax on the people of Ontario
and Saskatchewan.
Carbon taxes make life unaffordable for families, and put thousands of jobs at risk. This type of taxation does nothing for the environment and hits people in the wallet in order to fund big government initiatives."
Carbon taxes make life unaffordable for families, and put thousands of jobs at risk. This type of taxation does nothing for the environment and hits people in the wallet in order to fund big government initiatives."
Is there to much crap going
into our environment? Of course there
is; it would be pretty hard to argue that, which is why the need for a genuine
and achievable climate strategy is a given.
Simply implementing a tax on carbon that only sucks money out of the
pockets of consumers, to then be funneled into government general revenues, is
NOT the way to see that happen.
Different targets ...
different approaches ... and high level goals with no guidance on how they are
to be implemented. That's the "All In" approach of Justin
Trudeau's federal Liberal government.
It's an all in
approach our John Horgan GreeNDP government should abandon, but they (like the
previous bc LIBERALS) are too addicted to the money they receive from punitive
taxes imposed on us.
- Carbon Taxes are doing nothing for the environment of British Columbia ...
- Carbon taxes make the everyday necessities of life more and more un-affordable for families
- Carbon taxes put high paying jobs at risk in resource and industry communities where government regulations already are already in place to protect the environment.
As Kerri Simms, of the BC Taxpayers Federation, said this
Spring, "The carbon
tax is not an accounting exercise for B.C. families. It’s an expensive reality
for any Canadian subjected to it. If
taking billions of dollars away from Canadians doesn’t reduce emissions, then,
what is the point of this forced carbon tax?"
One can only hope that soon in BC we too will have a premier who will join
with Doug Ford and Scott Moe in saying their goal is to, "create good jobs and drive economic
growth across the country.”
Hopefully
they'll be all-in on that ... and not all-in on finding more and more ways to
tax.
In Kamloops, I'm Alan
Forseth
Comments
Post a Comment