To the Editor,
Re: Columnist too dismissive of carbon tax, Letters, Sept. 26.
The article in the Sept. 9 Alberni Valley News by Tom Fletcher is bang on. This carbon tax will do nothing but make everything more costly for British Columbians.
Just because MP Richard Cannings heard from the Chinese minister that China, who are near the top of the list of top of polluters of this planet, are moving as fast as possible from coal to renewables seems a pretty vague assurance. How fast is “fast as possible”? Ten years, 20 years, 50 years, 100 years?
What will replace that cheap source of energy that fuels thousands of Chinese industries that produce so many disposable and unrepairable items that we purchase time and time again?
The letter writer says Mr. Canning also states that China is joining France and Germany in phasing out gas and diesel powered vehicles. Which phase? When? Can you imagine the 70–80 percent of Chinese citizens who currently live in poverty being able to afford to buy a shiny new electric vehicle?
What about the other major polluters in the world with exploding populations? Say to them, “Uh sorry, just put the brakes on your developing economies by not using any fossil fuels?”
The much touted line that research and development into alternate energy will create thousands of new jobs never seems to take into effect the thousands of jobs lost, and the ripple effect in the economy due to reduced spending of people who are already squeezed to the limit with other taxes.
The carbon tax is an ineffectual money grab because it does not address the main causes of airborne and other pollution in a manner that all nations are part of. You want to get serious about this, then get serious and believable commitments/timelines from the world’s worst polluters.
Countries worldwide can’t even collect and recycle all the types of plastics that make up food and goods packaging that end up in landfills worldwide. Are industries going to make affordable repair parts and make repairs less costly for what we buy so we don’t have to keep buying more? You know why, and I know why.
It does however make a good excuse for politicians to use when asked what is being done to address pollution and keeps the money rolling in.
A. Casey,
Port Alberni
