The Made-in-Manitoba Plan

by Eric Rempel

The Manitoba Government is to be commended for producing a plan that outlines how we in Manitoba intend to address the biggest challenges of our time – greenhouse gas production, climate change and the depletion of strategic earthen resources, most critically fossil fuels. It suitably follows the Beyond Kyoto Plan of 2008 and the TomorrowNow Plan of 2012, both produced by the previous NDP Government. Unfortunately both of the NDP plans have not achieved their goal.. This has been pointed out in the recent Auditor General's report.

The Auditor General's report should surprise no one. Look around. We have not changed the way we use our cars, we have not changed the way we heat our homes and agricultural practices have not changed significantly, in the way fossil fuel is used.

Will this new plan be any different? There is good reason to doubt that it will be.

The new Plan acknowledges the need for urgent action with respect to green house gas production, that a price on carbon is needed to reduce the consumption of carbon based fuels, and that a carbon levy or carbon tax is the most efficient and effective way to put a price on carbon. But then unfortunately, as the Plan gets into how a carbon levy will be administered, the Plan lapses into a totally ineffective, unnecessary attack on the federal carbon levy mandate, that significantly undermines its earlier own arguments.

In the implementation section of the plan, it argues that the collection of taxes through a carbon levy will create hardship for people, so it should not be done. The unfortunate fact is that almost all of the proposed interventions in the plan will cost money. The money will need to come from somewhere. The only possible source for the funding of positive interventions can be from a carbon tax that will complement the positive interventions proposed. True, a carbon tax is another tax, and none of us like taxes, but unlike most taxes which are not designed to alter behavior, this one is meant to alter behavior in a positive way.

The federal mandate is that each province needs to apply a carbon levy. Beginning in 2018 it needs to be $10 per tonne, increasing every year by $10 until it reaches $50 per tonne in in 2022. The revenue from this carbon levy remains within the province to be applied however the province wishes. Quite simple, really.

The Made-in-Manitoba Climate and Green Plan finds problems with this plan – hence the need for a Made-in-Manitoba plan. The Plan alleges that the federal mandate does not recognize the contribution Manitoba is already making to reduce green house gas production. The Plan points out that Manitoba is rich in hydro-electricity, so it uses less carbon based fuel, so Manitoba is already doing more than its share to reduce greenhouse gas production hence it is not fair and not reasonable for Manitoba to collect the same carbon fee as the rest of the country.

I have trouble following that logic. Let's try to follow the logic: consider a home owner in Manitoba. This homeowner needs to heat his house. This home owner can chose between hydro electric energy or carbon based natural gas. In the rest of Canada, a carbon levy will increase the price of the natural gas energy, thereby increasing the incentive to choose hydro electricity. But such an incentive is not suitable for Manitoba! Because we have ready access to relatively cheap hydro-electricity, Manitobans should pay a $25 carbon levy rather than the $50 levy mandated by the federal government. If you can follow that logic, please help me!

Also the Made-in-Manitoba Plan finds the phase-in of the federal plan over a five year period problematic. For Manitoba, the Plan finds, an immediate levy of $25, which will not increase, is more suitable than the federally imposed levy of $50 phased in over a period of time. I find this a very petty argument.

The Made-in-Manitoba Plan is a good document inviting public input into a significant planning exercise. It is unfortunate that the Plan authors need to devote space to attacking the federal carbon levy mandate. This attack significantly weakens the plan in that it argues for something that has nothing to do with the welfare of Manitobans. I suspect the argument is seen to be in the interest of the conservative party.

We have some other issues with the plan, and we will address in future columns. Meanwhile we encourage readers to examine the plan online and respond.

We at the South Eastman Transition Initiative think Global Climate Change is a problem, that if not dealt with will cause huge hardships for our children and grandchildren. It would be so good to see our political parties rising above partisan bickering as we tackle this monumental problem.