Dear Editor:
An open letter to Rod Phillips, Ontario’s Minister of Environment, Conservation and Parks.
I, like many other residents of Ontario, have been waiting with bated breath for your government’s highly anticipated report on how we are to preserve and protect our environment in the coming years.
I find the report lacking in specifics as to how the government actually hopes to achieve the goals it purports to reach. It strikes me that the document is no more than a “fluff” piece; a very attractive and likely expensive piece, but all the same “fluff”.
The world has reached a point where its survival is now being debated and your government is proposing to initiate a plan that has been tried elsewhere and failed.
Contrary to what your government may believe, the only tried and proven system that has actually reduced pollution and with it, global warming, is general carbon taxation.
No one likes paying taxes, particularly big business, but we are past the point of debating the issue on how many taxes we are paying. We are looking at the survival of the planet and to find a cure for what ails us we need to be resourceful, dedicated and ruthless. We need to ensure that we have a system that will actually reduce emissions.
Your government’s proposed system has already been proven ineffective. Time is running out; we do not have the luxury of wasting the next four years maintaining business as usual while our world becomes ever warmer and polluted.
You are putting your trust in business to self regulate by working hand-in-hand with the government and the people of Ontario in reducing emissions. But big business does not work that way; its priority is always the bottom line.
Even within your own report you state, “We will consider factors such as trade exposure, competitiveness and process emissions, and allow the province to grant across-the-board exemptions for industries of particular concern, like the auto sector, as needed.” In other words, you would give big business carte blanche priority over the health of our environment.
Our economy is important but in the grand scheme of things it is secondary to the air we breathe and the water we drink. Please do not allow ideology to take precedence and put the “cart before the horse.”
Finally, the message I get from reading this report is that your government has few constructive plans to meet the challenges that lie ahead.
Mike Shackleford, BELWOOD