The Great Procrastinators- Getting Bizzy

Recently, the David Suzuki Foundation released a recommendation for a national carbon tax program similar to those used in Europe. In the report, the Foundation stated that a national carbon tax program could help to raise funds in the neighbourhood of $50 billion a year for our government, which would allow for drastic reduction of other taxes. The Harper government released a statement that they have no intentions of implementing such a program, and instead intend to pursue a regulatory approach. Of course, this "regulatory" approach has been used ineffectively by Canadian government for decades, and we would only hope that Mr Harper would be aware of the past failures of the government he is charged with. The current regulatory goals that have been set out by the Canadian government call for a 20% reduction of greenhouse gases by 2020. However, current emissions are so far above the 1990 levels noted for Kyoto that a 20% reduction is more of a return to 1990 levels than a reduction at all.

Furthermore, the provinces are free to set their own regulations, with Alberta setting the stingy goal of 14% by 2050. In the past, this kind of political pandering has proven to be nothing more than a mechanism for businesses to forward their own agendas. This is done by placing economic pressure on the provinces to lower their own standards by threatening to relocate their operations elsewhere. We see this already in Alberta's barely existent regulations, since the oil sands are the base for the province's booming economy. We cannot possibly expect them to choose the environment over the survival of their economy, which is why it is so imperative for Ottawa to take a leadership role in improving our environmental record.

Ottawa faces two courses of action if we truly want to change our place as one of the worst polluters in the world. First, we must implement legislation at the federal level to halt the regulatory "race to the bottom" that has taken place over the last few decades. By relieving some of the pressure from the provinces, we allow them to take a proactive role in exceeding the minimum requirements instead of being forced to opt out of them. Second, by implementing a carbon tax program, we can use capitalism to our ecological advantage (who knew?) by making it in the best interests of corporations to be more environmentally friendly. Subsequently, individual income tax could be reduced, some of which would cover the inevitably higher costs of the new eco-products. What is most important to remember, however, is that these programs are not mutually exclusive. Either one implemented on its own would produce positive environmental changes, but combined they have the potential to change our place in the world. It is about time that our governments began to realize that concern for the environment is not a fad, and ignoring it will only leave us in the wake of the many others who have embraced it.