Loopholes offer sweet deal for big polluters

One columnist making cheap'n'easy journalistic hay (3 columns: like the old Batman show - biff! bam! kapow!) ...

Loopholes offer sweet deal for big polluters
Out-of-province cruise ships, flights, trucks won't pay

Michael Smyth
The Province
Sunday, June 29, 2008

Gordon Campbell says his carbon tax will whallop everyone equally, but read the fine print of the regulations and what do you find?

Loopholes big enough for Arnold Schwarzenegger to drive his fleet of Hummers through! Check out who WON'T be paying the carbon tax come Tuesday:

Cruise ships

Cruise ships with a port of call outside of British Columbia -- pretty much all of them -- won't have to pay the carbon tax. This despite the fact that cruise ships pump out more carbon dioxide on a per-passenger basis than a Boeing 747.

International shipping

Local ships plying our domestic waters must pay the carbon tax, but international ships won't. So if a tugboat hauls a log up the coast to a local sawmill, it gets whacked with the tax. But export a barge of raw logs to the United States or China and those logs travel carbon-tax-free. How is this good for the environment again?

By the way, the shipping and cruising industries fought hard for these carbon-tax exemptions.

"This decision follows discussions between government officials and the Chamber of Shipping members over the previous month," the chamber revealed on its website. "The Chamber of Shipping is pleased the department engaged industry in the regulatory development, listened to the marine carriers' concerns, and decisively took the appropriate action."

Well, bully for them! Now don't you wish there was a Chamber of Barbecuing that could have snagged an exemption for your propane tank?

Out-of-province flights

Aviation fuel used for flights within B.C. get whacked by the carbon tax, but flights in and out of the province do not.

That means if you fly from Vancouver to Prince George to visit your sick mom, or if you hop a floatplane to Victoria on a business trip, get set to pay the carbon-tax man. But when Campbell flies to Hawaii to relax at his vacation property, he flies carbon-tax-free.

Or consider this scenario, which shows the regional unfairness of the carbon tax: A direct flight from Vancouver to Toronto is exempt from the carbon tax. But if you live in the boonies and have to take a connecting flight that touches down at YVR, the connecting flight gets whacked. Take that, B.C. heartlands!

Visiting military forces and diplomats

No carbon tax on American submarines at Nanoose Bay. You're welcome, Dubya.

Fuel used on, or delivered to, native reserves by aboriginal people

That includes the Tsawwassen reserve. They don't start paying taxes under their new treaty for another eight years.

Fuel used to manufacture anodes in an electrolytic process for smelting aluminum

Translation into English, as spoken at the head office of Alcan: "Score!"

Fuel used as a reductant in the production of lead or zinc

Translation into English, as spoken at the head office of Teck-Cominco: "Sweet!"

Cross-border trucking

Truck a load of organic carrots up the road to the local farmers market and you get whacked with the carbon tax. But import a truckload of lettuce across the border from California, and that foreign food enters B.C. carbon-tax-free. Guess Campbell never heard of the 100 Mile Diet.

And many, many others

Including "industrial processes" in the cement and oil-and-gas sectors and "fugitive emissions" from farms and landfills.

Whalloping everyone equally, eh? When it comes to Campbell's carbon tax, some are more equal than others.

E-mail: msmyth@direct.ca

© The Vancouver Province 2008

Carbon tax could be Campbell's undoing
As federal Tories slam Stephane Dion, B.C. premier may face fallout

Michael Smyth
The Province
Friday, June 27, 2008

Saying Gordon Campbell's gas tax is facing a "perfect storm" of public anger has become something of a cliche in B.C., but it's hard to look at the political weather chart and come to a different forecast.

Take a look what happened just yesterday: Oil hit $140 a barrel for the first time ever, triggering triple-digit stock-market plunges in New York and Toronto. Gas prices in Vancouver ticked up another penny a litre, topping out at more than $1.48 in some locations. TransLink said it was considering new highway tolls or vehicle levies to raise money.

In other words, it was another day of terrible news for anyone who has to drive a car or truck to make a living or get on with their lives.

And here comes Campbell with his 2.34-cents-a-litre gas tax to give you another kick in the chops this Tuesday. Campbell's tax could have the dubious distinction of pushing the price at the pump past the psychological barrier of $1.50 a litre.

Happy Canada Day, chump, and enjoy the salt in your wounds.

For the first time ever, meanwhile, public anxiety over soaring energy prices has become the No. 1 concern of British Columbians.

According to the Mustel polling company, worries about energy costs have trumped the environment, the economy, health care, crime and every other worrisome category. Talk about a bad time to raise the anxiety level.

It's starting to take a toll on the Liberals. The governing party has dropped two points to 47-per-cent support in the Mustel poll, while Carole James and the NDP have climbed six points to 37 per cent.

Now that's still a healthy 10-point gap for the Libs. And the thought of Gordon Campbell losing the May election because of his carbon tax is still difficult to imagine, despite the rising tide of anger.

Think about it: The New Democrats would probably jack up your taxes even higher if they ever got back into power. (And don't forget James has said she would bring in a carbon tax, too, but she's awfully shifty about how much it would be and who would pay it.)

But the polls are still going in the wrong direction for Campbell. And now the federal Conservatives are piling on a with a relentless campaign of negative attack ads against federal Liberal Leader Stephane Dion's call for a national carbon tax.

"It's the same old story: The Dion tax trick," say the Tory radio ads burning up the airwaves yesterday. "Everybody sees through it."

Do you think the average ticked-off, taxed-out driver is going to make the distinction between the federal and provincial Liberal parties when he hears those ads? Campbell will get hit with the collateral damage.

Now I'm starting to wonder just how much resolve either Liberal outfit has to weather this perfect storm. The federal Libs hinted this week at special accommodation for coal-dependent Nova Scotia while B.C. Finance Minister Colin Hansen said he was willing to "work with" the B.C. trucking industry, which will get severely hammered by Campbell's gas tax.

If they start cutting special deals -- while the little guy gets whacked -- that could be the last straw for many voters.

E-mail: msmyth@direct.ca

© The Vancouver Province 2008

NDP laughing all the way to the bank
Issue breathes life into Opposition as Libs remain arrogant

Michael Smyth
The Province
Thursday, June 26, 2008

Just five days to go before British Columbians get whacked by Gordon Campbell's gas tax and now the Liberals are suddenly figuring something out:

With gas prices already soaring, people don't like having salt rubbed in their wounds. And unless the Liberals change their tune, this grossly unfair and ineffective carbon tax is going back up on them like a bad burrito.

So Campbell sent his newly minted finance minister out to defend the tax yesterday. With the NDP going to town with an Axe The Gas Tax campaign, Colin Hansen went on the offensive.

"It is totally disingenuous," Hansen railed against the New Democrats. "They profess to be in favour of a carbon tax and then go out and launch a campaign to oppose the carbon tax."

Notice his tricky use of grammar in the above sentence: Yes, the NDP supports "a" carbon tax -- just not his.

Yesterday, NDP critic Shane Simpson said the NDP favoured a system of "carbon pricing" that doesn't include a new tax at the gas pump.

No duh. Even federal Liberal Leader Stephane Dion was smart enough to realize you don't hammer people with gas taxes when the price has gone up 33 per cent in four months.

But Dion's call for a federal carbon tax just means more trouble for Campbell.

Now the federal Conservatives under Prime Minister Stephen Harper are getting set to launch a vicious national campaign of attack ads against Dion's proposed tax.

The Tories will be brutal in their assaults. Harper has already called Dion's carbon tax an "insane" policy that will "screw everybody."

I doubt the approaching attack ads will be as polite.

And Campbell is going to get slimed with the collateral damage. Voters won't make the federal/provincial distinction. They'll just hear "Liberal" and "carbon tax." And then they'll get mad.

So now Hansen is trying to fight back. But his shots yesterday were pathetically weak.

"They've got big challenges within their own party," he insisted about the NDP. "They've got people who are ripping up their NDP membership cards."

Ripping up their membership cards? He wishes! The NDP are delighted Campbell is pushing ahead with his gas tax. It's the best issue they've had in a long time.

Now the New Democrats are even encouraging people to donate their $100 climate-change cheques from the government to the NDP so they can fight the gas tax. They're laughing all the way to the bank!

Campbell could stop the bleeding today if he wanted to. He could simply announce the soaring price of gas is doing the job of his carbon tax.

Then he could just cancel or postpone it.

But he's already crossed the Rubicon. The premier's famous stubborn streak will hurt the Liberals this time.

E-mail: msmyth@direct.ca

© The Vancouver Province 2008