Liberal Party MP Martha Hall Findlay talks about Stephane Dion's plan for a carbon tax.  The carbon tax will save the planet, right?  We'll be encouraged to consume less energy, right?

According to Findlay, there's no way to really know, or to be sure if it's really working.

Still, that's no reason not to impose a tax on Canadians.

Martha Hall Findlay explains the priorities behind Stephane Dion's carbon tax:

Findlay, now the MP for the riding of Willowdale in North York, spoke passionately to her party faithful at the Best Western Parkway Inn about the carbon tax strategy that has dominated the media in recent months.

The new taxes from Liberal leader Stephane Dion's plan are expected to generate more than $15 billion in revenue in four years. But the plan is intended to be revenue neutral because it will cut income taxes and increase family support payments.

Findlay said it's impossible to calculate the emission reduction numbers at this point, "because energy prices have gone up so much, we don't know how the shift will affect consumption," she said.

So let me get this straight.  Martha Hall Findlay gets an opportunity to explain the Stephane Dion's plan to save the planet from global warming through a tax.

And the best she can come up with is that it might not actually have any effect?  That consumption is already being affected so much by pure market forces, that the effect of a carbon tax might be negligible as far as consumption is concerned?  Even if there is a drop, there is no way to allocate a consumption drop between fuel price increases and the carbon tax?

Well, if you have no confidence that a carbon tax will actually affect carbon consumption, then why proceed?

Liberal MP Ken Boshcoff brags about all the money that the carbon tax will shift out of Alberta and into Ontario.  Liberal MP Martha Hall Findlay makes it clear that the Liberals are proceeding with this massive inter-provincial money shift without any idea if it will have any environmental impact.

Two Liberal MPs, two admissions that the Liberal carbon tax has only a tenuous connection to the environment.  It might work.  It might not.  No one really knows. 

But that's OK, because the one thing we know for sure the carbon tax will do is cost Canadians billions in tax money, billions the Liberal can use to fund new social programs.  According to Boshcoff, it's about pulling money out of Alberta to hand over to Ontario voters.  To potential Liberal voters.

Indeed, if carbon consumption isn't affected, as Martha Hall Findlay admits is a possibility, those billions of vote-buying dollars will continue to roll in.

And if carbon consumption drops by accident, that's OK.  The carbon tax can always be cranked up to keep those vote-buying revenues steady.

Hey, maybe that's what "revenue neutral" means.  If Stephane Dion gets his carbon tax, revenues for Liberal government spending is guaranteed never to dry up, and those loyal Liberal voters will keep coming back for more Alberta-funded largesse.

It's just a tax.  The whole environment thing?  It's just greenwashing to mask the bitter taste of cynical regionally-divisive tax on top of all the others we pay even as oil costs go up and up.

More at the Alberta Aardvark.

Posted by: Steve Janke at 10:10 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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