Carbon Tax woes dog Dion.

This is from the Star.

I expect Harper advisors saw the Green Shift as a Golden Opportunity to sink the Liberal campaign because it is complicated and difficult to market. Canadians make great environmentalists as long as they think plans may cost them little and they are simple but Harper has been able to frighten potential buyers from the plan. It has become a contanimated environmental plan as far as many voters are concerned and no matter what defences Dion might give the plan does not seem to be selling among many.
I find it surprising that Dion should promise to reverse Harper's income trust decisions. That is reactionary. It is true that Harper broke his promise but surely the decision was not a reactionary one. This is one more sign the Liberals are the Lehman Bros. of Canadian political parties.

Carbon tax woes dog Dion TheStar.com - Federal Election - Carbon tax woes dog Dion


TOM HANSON/THE CANADIAN PRESS
Liberal Leader Stephane Dion announces his carbon tax plan on Parliament Hill, June 19, 2008. A former Liberal cabinet minister says people don't understand the plan.
September 15, 2008 Richard BrennanOTTAWA BUREAU
ST. JOHN'S, NFLD — Newfoundlanders are "afraid' of Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion's carbon tax, says a former Liberal cabinet minister.
John Efford said people in the province may distrust Prime Minister Stephen Harper, but they're afraid that the proposed carbon tax is going drive up the cost of fuel.
"I can tell you the average person on the street don't understand the carbon tax," Effort, a former natural resources minister, told reporters after listening to Dion speak in St. John's.
"They are afraid of that," he said, noting that gasoline was selling in Newfoundland this morning at $1.49 a litre.
Efford, who served in Paul Martin's Liberal government, said he realizes it is too late for Dion to ditch the policy, but "I think he has got a big sell on his hands."
Speaking this morning, Dion said a Liberal government would invest $250 million to help Canada's fisheries modernize their fleets and reduce their impact on the environment. He also pledged to spend $100 million on small-craft harbours and invest in retiring commercial fishing licences in areas hardest hit by the collapse of fish stocks.
Dion also came out swinging against the Conservatives, telling Canadians that Harper will first break his word and then break their hearts.
He hammered away at his message that Harper can't be trusted to keep his promises or run the economy, giving the example of seniors that believed Harper when he said in the last election he wouldn't tax income trusts and then did anyway.
"They believed Stephen Harper that he wouldn't tax income trust and they put their saving in income trust and once he was prime minister he came with a punitive tax of 31.5 per cent," he said, promising that the Liberals would undo the tax.

Carbon Tax: Who wins, who loses?

This is from the Star.
The results of the tax are difficult to predict and also who exactly will win and lose. I find it strange that Dion should trot this tax out as a center piece of his policy. It is certainly not at all clear that it is the sort of policy that can be easily sold to the public or that it will in any way increase his popularity at this juncture when people are already angry at high costs of fuel. There may be little appetite and much aversion to a policy that is perceived to increase costs even though it is claimed to be revenue neutral. Sometimes I wonder if some are plotting to have Dion fail! Of course many environmentalists will applaud the tax but this may not translate into a more widespread increase in voter support.
The Liberals have already lost any credibility in my view because of their craven support of Conservative policies that they claim to oppose. Harper may just as well have had a majority since the Liberals are unwilling to challenge him except with their mouths.

Carbon tax: Who wins, who loses? TheStar.com - comment - Carbon tax: Who wins, who loses?
June 23, 2008 Carol Goar
Bill Graham always had a talent for cutting through political bafflegab.
It is a shame the Liberal elder statesman – who served as interim party leader, foreign affairs minister, defence minister and five-term MP for Toronto-Centre-Rosedale – is no longer a member of Stéphane Dion's caucus.
With one simple question, he pierced the attractive packaging of the Liberal leader's carbon tax plan. "What does revenue-neutral mean? It sounds nice when you say it, but it will create winners and losers. Who's going to win, who's going to lose and who's going to pay?"
Unfortunately, Graham – who is now chancellor of Trinity College at the University of Toronto – didn't ask that question in Ottawa. He posed it at a panel discussion in Toronto, organized by the Institute for Research on Policy Public.
The influential think-tank invited the city's business leaders, bankers, economists, energy experts and political analysts to a two-hour working lunch last week to discuss the challenges of crafting a carbon tax that doesn't undermine Canada's competitiveness, doesn't exacerbate regional disparities, doesn't cause federal-provincial battles and doesn't trigger a public backlash.
It was an enlightening session. The three panellists – Mark Jaccard of Simon Fraser University, Thomas Courchene of Queen's University and Sam Boutziouvis of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives – laid out the complexities of taxing fossil fuel use in daunting detail.
It would force exporters to jack up their prices, putting them at a disadvantage in world markets. To protect Canada's share of global trade, Ottawa might have to exempt products destined for sale abroad from the tax.
It could induce energy-dependent manufacturers to move to countries with lax environmental policies. The one percentage point cut in corporate tax rates that Dion is offering, plus the incentives for investing in green technologies, may not be enough to stem the outflow.
Imposing a carbon tariff could contravene Canada's trade obligations. It is unclear how a Liberal government could penalize imports from countries with lax environmental policies without violating the World Trade Agreement.
Putting a price on pollution would hurt some regions more than others. The impact would be particularly severe in the industrial heartland, which is already reeling from high energy prices and a sputtering economy; and the western oil sands, which spew huge amounts of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere.
Finally, all the revenue from Dion's carbon tax would flow into federal coffers. Provinces that took the lead – such as British Columbia with its groundbreaking carbon tax and Quebec with its tax on oil and gas distributors – would be expected to join the federal plan, losing their right to distribute the proceeds of the tax according to provincial needs.
"This is going to be messy – really messy," Jaccard warned.
No one in the room needed much convincing. For all Dion's talk about simplicity and fairness, it is clear the "green shift" he is proposing would be one of the most complex, challenging and divisive policy initiatives in Canadian political history.
But it took Graham's plain-spoken intervention to bring the debate back to basics.
He asked the question millions of Canadians will be asking, as they ponder Dion's climate change plan: Will I be a winner or a loser?
The Liberal leader's pledge to return every dollar of his carbon tax doesn't really answer that question.
Collectively, Canadians will be no worse off. But individually, their fates will vary, depending on how much they earn, where they live, how they heat their home, what they do for a living, how many children they have and how much flexibility they have to shrink their carbon footprint.
What Dion is proposing is a massive wealth transfer, designed to clean up the atmosphere, cut poverty and transform the industrial landscape.
If more voters see themselves as winner than losers, Dion's plan will fly. If not, it will fail.
The technicalities of taxing carbon may be opaque. The political calculus is crystal clear.
Carol Goar's column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

A Carbon Tax is the Wrong Approach

As I read this I was wondering if the Ottawa Citizen had been bought out by friends of Harper or the Canadian Taxpayer''s Association but then I find that it was just Gary Lunn, Minister of Natural Resources, using the Citizen as a free propaganda vehicle. This is from the Ottawa Citizen.


Monday » June 2 » 2008

A carbon tax is the wrong approach

The Ottawa Citizen
Monday, June 02, 2008
We have all felt the pinch at the pumps recently, as the price of gas has risen in leaps and bounds.
The opposition has said the government should fix the price -- while at the same time calling for massive gas taxes. This is hypocritical.
Canadians are smart. They know that the world price of oil and gas is based on supply and demand. With countries like China and India growing very quickly, their demand grows, and so there is a higher price.
Stéphane Dion's carbon tax plan (which could be the largest tax increase in our nation's history) would push gas prices and heating oil prices to record levels, and this would have a domino effect and push up the cost of everything we buy, sell, or trade.
Food, services and even goods we export would rise in cost.
That is not good for our economy, and especially hard on middle- and low-income families. Stéphane Dion and Jack Layton would probably be fine, but average hard-working Canadians, particularly those people with fixed incomes, would suffer.
Since coming to office just over two years ago our Conservative government has taken actions that will provide nearly $200 billion in tax relief over 2007-08 and the following five years. This will reduce the federal tax burden to its lowest point in nearly 50 years.
That means Canadians are keeping more of what they earn. In fact, with the GST being reduced to five per cent, Canadians will save half a billion dollars more on gas alone this year. At the same time, we have invested more than $9 billion in green programs, while forcing big oil and big industry to cut their greenhouse gas emissions. Canadians know how to choose between higher taxes and lower taxes.
With Stéphane Dion we would hurt Canada's economy, and hurt low and middle-income families who can't afford his massive carbon tax.
Gary Lunn, Ottawa
Minister of Natural Resources
© The Ottawa Citizen 2008

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Layton: Carbon tax would hurt poor.

Layton is probably correct but then the solution could be to have policies that neutralise any effects on the less well, off not dumping the carbon tax. Many environmentally friendly policies will hurt the poor. Environmentalists are not always very sensitive to this so it is good that Layton should point out the effects on the poor. However, the cap and trade policy could also increase prices for products manufactured by companies involved and also hurt the poor who must use them. This is from the Star.



Carbon tax would hurt poor, NDP says TheStar.com - Canada - Carbon tax would hurt poor, NDP says
Layton criticizes Liberal plan for levy on fossil fuel, saying heating a house in Canada is a necessity
May 23, 2008 Joanna SmithOttawa Bureau
Ottawa–A carbon tax would place an unfair burden on low-income Canadians, Jack Layton said yesterday.
"Those advocating a carbon tax suggest that by making the costs for certain things more expensive, people will make different choices," Layton said.
"But Canada is a cold place and heating your home really isn't a choice."
The New Democratic Party leader was at a fundraiser for an Ottawa homeless shelter to talk about poverty but used the platform to criticize a Liberal climate change plan that has not even been introduced.
He also plugged his own global warming solution.
Layton said the most effective way to combat climate change would be a cap-and-trade system that penalizes industrial polluters whose emissions surpass a certain level.
He also supports a national program that would retrofit homes and buildings to make them more energy efficient.
"Instead of making it more expensive to heat your home while consuming the same amount of energy and emitting the same amount of pollution, I want to help make it more affordable to heat your home – by helping to make it more energy efficient and pollute less," he said.
Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion is expected to announce a climate change plan that would penalize activities that contribute to global warming. Dion maintains his scheme would be revenue neutral, with taxes it raises returned to Canadians in the form of lower personal and corporate income taxes. As well, the tax code would be tweaked to help low-income earners, Liberals say.
Layton told reporters after his speech that he recognizes that getting serious about fighting climate change might mean economic hardship, but he said any hard times should fall first to the biggest polluters.

Tax emissions or miss targets...

This is from the Star.
Since neither Harper nor even Dion are in favor of a carbon tax, we can only conclude that targets will be missed unless there is a big change of heart on the part of the Conservatives or Liberals. If the tax is so terrible for the economy how is that Quebec already has such a tax. I didn't think Quebec was interested in economic suicide. One problem with such a tax is that it will be passed on to consumers and will impact most negatively on those least able to pay the increased prices.

Tax emissions or miss targets, PM told

TOM HANSON/THE CANADIAN PRESS
Glen Murray, chair of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, answers reporters questions at a news conference on Jan. 7 in Ottawa to discuss the round table's report.

What exactly is a carbon tax?

It's a pollution tax that levies a fee on the production, distribution or use of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas. When burned, the carbon in these fuels turns into carbon dioxide, the chief greenhouse gas. Quebec implemented Canada's first carbon tax last year and collects almost one cent per litre of gasoline or diesel fuel sold in the province.
Carbon fee only way to meet climate-change targets, panel advises Ottawa

Jan 08, 2008 04:30 AM
Bruce Campion-Smith
Ottawa bureau chief

OTTAWA–Prime Minister Stephen Harper will have to accept carbon taxes or other charges on greenhouse gases if his government is to have any hope of meeting its climate-change targets.

That is the main message from a blue-ribbon panel on the environment asked by the federal Conservatives to assess their long-term strategy for cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

The government wants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 65 per cent by 2050.

Introducing a new charge on fossil fuels is the only way to ensure Canada succeeds in cutting its emissions, the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy said in a report yesterday.

The new charge would mean Canadians would face higher costs to heat and light their homes and to pump gas into their cars, the panel says.

"As long as ... carbon can be emitted freely, it will be extremely challenging, to say the least, to achieve any significant reductions," said Glen Murray, the former Winnipeg mayor who chairs the panel.

"Market-based policies that put a price on carbon to send an economy-wide signal on emissions are the most effective way to achieve deep, long-term greenhouse gas emission reductions of the scale being considered," he told a news conference.

The arms-length agency, which is made up of industry and academic players as well as environmentalists, says the proposed measures would have a "relatively limited" impact on the economy.

Both Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion have ruled out a carbon tax as a possible solution to fighting climate change.

Quebec implemented Canada's first carbon tax last year. It collects just under one cent a litre of gasoline or diesel fuel sold in the province.

In its 77-page report, the national panel said the federal government must quickly introduce some form of tax if it hopes to meet its own goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 65 per cent by 2050.

"Our job is to push government, and not just the governing party, but Parliament and Canadians and industrial leaders and provinces into ... workable solutions," Murray said. "You need some sort of a price mechanism that's significant."

The report acknowledges there will be "pain" for Canadians as fossil fuels are slapped with a tax based on their carbon content. That could mean a 50 per cent increase in electricity costs, a 60 per cent jump in natural gas costs and a doubling of gas prices by 2050, the report predicts.

However, the panel also attempts to put those big numbers in context, noting that the price of gas jumped by 50 per cent at times during 2005 alone.

"These price effects are likely not outside the ongoing energy price swings we have experienced," the report says.

And the report also makes clear that it expects higher costs to pressure Canadians to do more to conserve energy, by retrofitting homes and switching to more fuel-efficient cars. As a result, the report says overall energy costs could fall by 15 per cent for the average household, despite the higher prices.

"More fuel efficient cars that use less use gas will cost consumers less. ... Isn't that a better way to run an economy by using less resources?" Murray said.

The report presents two options for levying a carbon charge – a so-called carbon tax that would impose a price on each unit of carbon dioxide emitted by a company, or a cap-and-trade system that would set a limit on the volume of greenhouse gas emission but allow companies to trade their quotas in the marketplace.

Either scenario or a combination of the measures has the "potential to achieve deep greenhouse gas emission reductions," said David McLaughlin, the panel's president and chief executive officer.

"The key is to put an economy-wide price on emissions," he said.

Environment Minister John Baird said the government would review the panel's recommendations, but rejected the suggestion of a carbon tax, saying "a new tax sounds like a Liberal idea to me."

Instead, he called the Tories' mandatory reductions for big polluters "the best way to go.

"We believe we can regulate reductions in greenhouse gases. We regulated lead out of gasoline. We think this is a similar approach," he told reporters on Parliament Hill yesterday.

The report won quick praise from environmentalists, who urged the federal Conservatives to act quickly on its recommendations.

"Whether it's capping carbon emissions or charging for them, the key is for government to start moving now," said Dale Marshall, climate-change policy analyst for the David Suzuki Foundation.

"If we wait too long, Canada will not meet its targets. Delay has many risks, including higher cumulative emissions, a steeper carbon price down the road and increased economic costs," he said in a statement.

The Sierra Club of Canada called it "tremendously significant" that the panel, with its "predominantly" business membership, concludes that a price on carbon emissions is essential for Canada to meet its emissions targets.

"Highly significant as well is the National Round Table's conclusion that the economic impacts of making the transition to a low-emission future will be minimal, and be lower the faster we act," Jean Langlois, Sierra Club's national campaigns director, said in a statement.

Federal Liberals called the strategy a "clarion call" for action and said it highlighted the shortcomings of the Tories' "halting and timid" efforts on climate change.

Liberal environment critic David McGuinty said Harper should discuss the report and its fallout when he meets with provincial premiers and territorial leaders Friday night in Ottawa.

The report notes that Alberta and Ontario – the two provinces with the biggest share of emissions – stand to get hit the hardest by any price controls. But Murray said the provinces have the most to gain from investments in new technology to help curb emissions.