Hot Air Act

Today the Tories unveiled their so called "Clean Air Act" or as I like to call it the Hot Air Act. While this does play lip service to reducing GHG and smog, it puts off any targets or regulations until the distant future, when now is the time for clear targets. Clearly this shows the Tories are more interested in ideology than pragmatism, which perhaps explains why Garth Turner was increasingly dissatisfied with them. I should note that being a conservative and an environmentalists are not mutually exclusive, in fact over 1/3 of Conservative voters have the Green Party as their second choice. The British Conservatives, and governments of New York and California (both who are Republican) do take climate change serious and have actual real plans. Instead Harper wants to follow the worse conservatives on this, the Bush administration, rather than the right ones. Now I realize all regulations involve consultation and should be done in a way that allows for both economic growth and environmental sustainability, but the Conservatives had nine months to do this, so I ask where have they been. Considering the importance of the environment amongst younger generations, if I were the Conservatives I would take this issue more seriously as it could hurt them in the long-run. Even in Alberta, there is a strong environmental awareness so a plan to reduce GHG won't necessarily hurt Alberta's economy. In fact Alberta already is a leader in wind power and with a strong economy could easily be a green leader in environmentally friendly technologies. But rather than look for innovative solutions, they decide to take the easy way out.

Now some will say the Liberals did nothing on the environment, and I agree the Liberal performance was less than satisfactory, but this is no excuse for the Conservatives to do nothing. If anything this is an issue they could use to help their sagging fortunes. Others will say Kyoto Protocol was simply about buying emission credits from other countries and I agree that this is the wrong approach, just as doing nothing is. Finally some say global warming is a myth. I cannot say with 100% certainty whether it is long-term or temporary and who is causing it, but the risks involved if it is happening are so great that doing nothing would cause far more harm if it is happening (which it almost certainly is) than taking action if it isn't happening (which is highly unlikely). Using a quote from Andrew Coyne, John Godfrey pointed out that the Kyoto Protocol is like our insurance against global warming and I must say I fully concur. My initial opposition to ratifying the protocol was because the Liberals rushed it without a plan, not because I believe we should do nothing about global warming. Now is the time for all parties to put aside partisanship and roll up their sleeves and deal with this issue. If Rona Ambrose cannot, she should step aside as environment minister and let someone else take over. Considering how important the environment is in Quebec, maybe Harper should choose a Quebec environment minister who is well aware how important the environment is to Quebecers and how doing nothing will put their seat in jeopardy, although I suspect Harper being the ideologue he is made sure he choose someone who didn't care about the environment.