The Conference Board of Canada, in its recent “Annual Report Card” ranks Canada’s environmental performance 15th out of 17 countries with poor performances in greenhouse gas emissions, smog and waste generation.

The Report charged that Canadians generate more waste per person than any other country in the world and that only Australia produces more per capita greenhouse gas emissions than Canada.

This week, Prime Minister Stephen Harper joined with his good friend and mentor George W. Bush in declaring that the G8 countries, at their summit in Japan had made an "important advance" in controlling climate change by conceding the necessity of having a long-term mandatory goal to cut greenhouse gases in half by the year 2050.

Great in theory but the declaration offers no base year from which to measure the cuts and offers no short term goals that would set us on the way to a 50% reduction in gas emissions.

The G8 countries produce 62 per cent of the world’s greenhouse gases. While their declaration raises the prospect of big cuts by 2050, it doesn't commit anyone to deliver the goods. This week’s declaration simply defers the decision to adopt mandatory reductions to United Nations climate talks to be held in Copenhagen in December 2009.

Further, the decision appears to be conditional on having developing countries including: China, India, Brazil and others sign on to the program. In the meantime developing countries are saying that the G8 group should be taking the lead by reducing emissions now. Mr. Harper caps the discussion by suggesting that at the end of the day, we may not be talking about emission cuts but simply lowering the rate of growth.

Closer to home, Canadians have launched a debate on carbon taxes. British Columbia has already introduced a carbon tax. New Brunswick is seeking advice from the public in respect to the possible introduction of a carbon tax. The Federal Liberals have promised to introduce a carbon tax if they form the next government. According to a Harris-Decima poll released this week, Canadians, by a 2-to-1 margin favour strong measures to reduce carbon emissions but not everyone agrees.

Those who oppose carbon taxes, say we can’t afford them because they would increase the cost of transportation, destroy our trucking industry, unfairly target the poorest in society and be nothing more than a tax-grab.

When someone suggests that we could avoid the need for a carbon tax by slowing down our highway driving speeds, others suggest it’s not a good idea.
James Hansen, a leading climate expert who raised the alarm about global warming with the U.S. Congress some 20 years ago, says he's 99% sure those carbon emissions contribute significantly to global warming but he’s still not 100% sure.

So why should we pay more by way of a carbon tax to address a problem that may not exist?

David Suzuki admits that we aren't 100% sure that human activity is causing global warming.

The vast majority of the world's climate scientists will only
admit to being 90% certain that our carbon emissions are causing global warming on such a scale that we face global catastrophe if we fail to change our ways. Suzuki provides relevance with this question “If nine out of 10 doctors said your child needed an immediate life-saving operation, would you wait until all 10 agreed?”

The only way Governments can change public behaviour is by regulation, taxation or force. My preference is to use the tax system. Let’s assume the imposition of a 10% carbon tax and let’s assume that the tax caused people to drive less, heat less, light less and consume less (carbon).

And let’s assume further that the net out of pocket increase in cost for the average household would still be about $1,000 a year. If we lowered personal income tax payable by $1,000, the carbon tax would cost taxpayers nothing. If we treated carbon taxes as input costs against collected HST, businesses would not be penalized. There is only one loser in this scenario and that is the individual or business that does not pay income tax.

What if such individuals were given a prepaid credit card, equal to the projected annual cost of the carbon-tax that could be used to purchase food, clothing and other goods and services?

They would be freed from the carbon-tax burden.

In my opinion, we should not be blindly opposing a carbon-tax, we should be demanding that the details of any such tax-imposition provide offsetting tax relief or alternative compensation and provide monetary incentives for those who reduce their consumption of carbon-dependent fuels, energy and products.

W.E. (Bill) Belliveau is a Shediac resident and Moncton business consultant. He can be contacted at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com Atlantic Insight is a published Blog inventory of opinion articles published weekly in New Brunswick's print media as written by W.E. (Bill) Belliveau, who is a resident of Shediac, New Brunswick, and small business owner, operating his Moncton-based marketing consultancy, Bell Strategic. He can be reached by e-mail at mailto:bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com